Spanish Regional Accounts

The Spanish Regional Accounts (CRE) presents its estimates today, after adding the updated information of the 2024 extraordinary Statistical Review (RE-2024) to its compilation process of the economic aggregates of the Annual National Accounts.

Last September, the results of the main aggregates for the period 1995-2023 of the Annual National Accounts of Spain were released, after the implementation of RE-2024. This regulated revision across the EU responds to the need for national accounts to provide a measure of the economy as precise as possible at all times, which makes it imperative to have a periodic update of the statistical sources and estimation methods used for its compilation.

The impact of these improvements of the regulated extraordinary revision on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) amounted to 13.184 billion euros for the reference year 2021. This revision has a direct effect on regional GDP levels, according to the weight of each community in each branch of activity.

In addition, statistical changes have been incorporated in the sources and procedures for estimating the accounting aggregates of regional accounting, among which the following stand out:

• Among the new statistical sources, it is worth highlighting the incorporation of information derived from the 2021 Population and Housing Censuses, with special emphasis on the regionalisation of imputed rental services - in national accounts, the production of housing rental services includes both rental services for homes that are actually rented and those that are occupied by their owners (imputed rents), whether main or secondary. Also, the new regional information available due to the improvement in the coverage of the Structural Business Survey in the branches of activity of Education and Health (consistent with the update of the framework regulation of Business Statistics).
• Methods and procedures incorporate the methodological proposal for the regional estimation of the branch of activity Supply of electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning developed in the working group for the study of the systems of regional economic accounts attached to the Interterritorial Statistics Committee between 2020 and 2024.
• To calculate regional GDP at regional market prices, taxes and subsidies on products are allocated to regions based on the relative weight of gross value added of all industries in each region according to the European System of Accounts. A new allocation method, validated by the European Commission, has been implemented for territories that have specific tax systems that give rise to different tax rates on products within the same country, such as the Canary Islands, Ceuta and Melilla.

Once all these statistical changes have been incorporated into the CRE estimates, the autonomous communities that recorded the greatest increase in their GDP levels in 2021 were Cataluña (2,763 million euros), Madrid (2,297) and Andalucía (2,293).

Canarias (-1,436 million), Ceuta (-131 million) and Melilla (-82 million) recorded negative revisions due to the new regionalisation of taxes on products.

The changes derived from the RE-2024 affect the entire regional series of records (2000-2023) in order to have standardised, comparable data for all years.

However, it should be noted that while the results for the years 2000 to 2020 only include the statistical changes of this regulated extraordinary revision and have an impact mainly on the levels of value added and GDP, as described above, those for the years 2021, 2022 and 2023 also incorporate the usual update in the existing sources described in the ordinary annual review policy of the operations of INE accounts and have an additional impact on the rates of change.

The preview estimate of Spain's Annual National Accounts puts growth in GDP volume in 2023 at 2.7%.

Once these estimates have been incorporated into the SRA, the autonomous communities that recorded the greatest increase in their GDP in volume terms in 2022 were Illes Balears (5.7%), Canarias (5.1 %) and La Rioja (4.2 %).

In contrast, the regions that recorded the lowest real increase in their GDP were the autonomous cities of Ceuta (1.7%) and Melilla (1.8%) and Región de Murcia (2.0%).

All the national territories showed GDP growth higher than that of the European Union (EU-27), which was 0.4 %.

Comunidad de Madrid registered the highest GDP per capita in 2023, with €42,198 per inhabitant. It was followed by País Vasco (39,547 euros) and Comunidad Foral de Navarra (37,088 euros).

In turn, the regions with the lowest GDP per capita were the autonomous cities of Melilla (€20,479) and Ceuta (€22,751), followed by Andalusia (€23,218) and Extremadura (€23,604).

The national average stood at 30,968 euros per inhabitant and that of the European Union at 38,130 euros. Seven regions exceeded the national average and two exceeded the European average.

In relative terms, GDP per capita in Comunidad de Madrid was 36.3% higher than the national average in 2023. That of País Vasco, 27.7 % higher, and that of Comunidad Foral de Navarra, 19.8 % higher.

At the opposite extreme, GDP per inhabitant in the autonomous cities of Melilla and Ceuta was 33.9 % and 26.5 % below the national figure, respectively. And those of Andalusia and Extremadura were 25.0 % and 23.8 % below the Spanish average, respectively.

According to the established calendar, the implementation of the RE-2024 ends with the dissemination of the Input-Output table of the Spanish economy, referring to 2021, which will be released tomorrow, 19 December, together with the Inventory Guide of sources and methods of the Annual National Accounts: Supply and Use Tables.

This Inventory Guide will be updated at the end of 2025 in accordance with the timetable for the transmission of methodological documents relating to the RE-2024 proposed by Eurostat.

The data published today revises the estimates of the SRA since 2000 released in December last year. This is mainly due to the addition of the update of the Spanish National Accounts, as well as the availability of a greater number of sources of statistical information and the implementation of the statistical changes to the 2024 Statistical Revision. It also incorporates the first estimates for 2023.

The reference year 2021 is definitive, 2022 is provisional and 2023 is a preview.