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Outline of the Statistical Business Register
What is the Statistical Business Register?
The Statistical Business Register is being developed in accordance with Paragraph 1, Article 27 of the Statistics Act (Act No.53 of 2007). The results of various statistical surveys, such as the Economic Census, and the administrative records information (e.g., information on labour insurance, information on commercial and corporate registration), are integrated into the database. It is updated routinely to collect information on all establishments and enterprises, and to maintain this information up-to-date.
Information on establishments and enterprises across the country stored in the Statistical Business Register is used, for example, to extract survey subjects for statistical surveys conducted by administrative agencies, and is considered an important infrastructure to provide and manage the lists used by the national and local governments to compile economic statistics accurately.
The objective of developing the Statistical Business Register is to improve the accuracy of various statistical surveys conducted by the national and local governments. It is expected that the database will accordingly contribute to improvement in the accuracy of the System of National Accounting (GDP etc.), and the creation of new statistical data linked to various information using a common code as a key.
Legal Basis
The Statistical Business Register is being developed in accordance with Paragraph 1, Article 27 of the Statistics Act (Act No.53 of 2007) 
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Background to Introduction
This kind of database had been developed and deployed under the name of a business register from 1985 to the 1990s in major countries as a system to offer high-quality statistics within a limited budget.
In Japan, it has been regarded an urgent issue to determine the parent frame of establishments and enterprises accurately.
In the light of these circumstances, it was stipulated in Paragraph 1, Article 27 of the new Statistics Act enforced in April 2009, that the Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications shall develop an Statistical Business Register.
In FY 2010, a report on the status of this project was submitted to the Statistics Commission, Cabinet Office for the first time after the enforcement of the new Statistics Act. Then, an opinion about development and utilization of the Statistical Business Register formed by the Statistics Commission based on the report was submitted to the Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications. In response to this opinion, a "Policy for Developing the Statistical Business Register (decided by the Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications)" was formulated in March 2011.
Against this background, development of the Statistical Business Register is now under way.
Items Recorded in the Database
Items to be recorded in the database are those with high necessity, consisting of basic items according to the survey of the Economic Census (e.g., names of establishments and enterprises, addresses, industrial classification, number of employees, sales amount (income)), and items related to the Economic Census subject to other statistical surveys.
Main Functions of the Database
- Provision of parent frame data to each statistical survey
- Equalization of burdens on survey respondents in providing parent frame data (correction for duplication)
- Support for implementation of each statistical survey
