Special Session on Business Registers in emerging and developing countries

1. Special Session on Business Registers in emerging and developing countries Business Register in Azerbaijan State Statistical Committee of the Republic of Azerbaijan 2-4 September 2013, Geneva

2. The need of Business Register`s development and the legal framework The need of Business Register`s development In order to arrange data of rapidly growing number of the economic units and provide the basis for realization of statistical surveys, Ministry of Azerbaijan adopted the regulation on creating the state register in 1992. Under the regulation the work on creating the business register was conducted. The legal framework Civil Code of Azerbaijan, law on the State Statistics and Resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers on creating of the register are the legal basis of the Business Register. According to law on the State Statistics, Federal Public Statistics Serviceis the owner of the register of statistical units, and they are also managed by this Statistics Service.

3. Business Register is centralized and consists of 3 parts • Register of the legal entities, which includesall state registered entities, structural subdivisions (branches, local units, etc.) and branches or representative offices of the international companies, located in Azerbaijan; • Register of individuals which are involved in entrepreneurial activities; • Farm Register, which consists of landowners involved in agriculture, using family labor.

4. Scope and major purposes of the Business Register The register consists of the following: • all enterprises, institutions and organizations, public and religious organizations, cooperatives, stock exchanges, banks, broker offices, and other properties, regardless of the type of business activity and type of ownership; • divisions, subsidiaries and representative offices of enterprises and organizations operating in the territory of Azerbaijan and abroad; • entities and individuals involved in business activities; Major purposes of the Business Register in Azerbaijan • identification and creating system of the statistical units; • preparation and coordination tool; • source of information for statistical analysis of the enterprises and their demographics; • tool which attracts data from the administrative sources and tool for data dissemination.

5. Updating of the Business Register Since 1997 the Business Register is updated annually. In this process the following indicators are verified: • address of the units; • primary and secondary activities of the units; • state of the economic activity of the units; • number of employees and annual turnover in order to determine the size of the units and for subsequent stratification; • other indicators.

6. Quality of the Business Register • In 2008, the State Statistics Committee conducted a sampling observation. The purpose of the observation was quality control of the register of individuals involved in entrepreneurial activities. • After processing collected data and producing output tables, the analysis, which helped to evaluate the quality of the observation and the quality of the register of individuals, was made. Review of the statistical analysis on the results of the observation is an important procedure which gives an opportunity to control different characteristics of the universe.

7. Further actions and assistance Further actions • Attracting new administrative sources, updating business register data on local units; • Matching database of the register with the massive database of the tax system and other services; • Analysis of demographic changes; • Analysis of the variability of characteristics; • Uploading and regular updating business register on the website of the State Statistics Committee. Assistance • Assistance in recognition of the group of enterprises, adding them in business register and profiling

8. Thank you for your attention!