Central Business Register Inquiry 2013, Round 1
Zimbabwe, 2013 - 2014
Identification
ZWE_2013_CBR_v01_M
Central Business Register Inquiry 2013
Round 1
| Name | Country code |
|---|---|
| Zimbabwe | ZWE |
Enterprise Census [en/census]
The CBR is a database on enterprises/establishments operating in the economy covering all registered/licenced companies. The primary objective of establishing a CBR is to provide an up-to-date and reliable frame for economic censuses and surveys conducted by the Agency. In addition, basic statistics such as employment by sex, turnover by industry and sector can be derived from the register. The CBR is the first survey of its kind in Zimbabwe
The Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency, ZIMSTAT, is in the process of updating a Central Business Register, CBR. A CBR is a database of enterprises/establishments operating in the economy covering all industries and geographical regions engaged in the production of goods and/or services. The CBR is an important statistical tool that besides providing a master frame for conducting the sample survey for collection of data also provides basic statistics such as employment by sex, turnover by industry, sector, and region. A register of good quality will help to improve the efficiency of the National Statistical System, which in turn shall help to reduce response burden on the businesses.
The objectives of the survey would be:
• To create a comprehensive list of establishments and enterprises
• To establish a business directory based on the BR for public use
• To provide a master frame for the economic and social censuses and surveys:
- CIP (Manufacturing, Mining & Quarrying, Construction, Electricity and Water Supply and Distribution)
- Quarterly Employment Inquiry (QEI)
- Volume of Manufacturing Index (VMI)
- Business Tendency Survey (BTS)
- Census of Services (CoS)
- Census of Transport (CoT)
- Information and Communications Technologies (ICT)
• To derive basic economic statistics such as number of employees, turnover, etc.
Census/enumeration data [cen]
The CBR is an economic survey and the unit of analysis is the establishment.
Scope
The CBR collects information on the following data items:
- Particulars of Business
- Operating status of the establishment
- Year of Commencement of business of the establishment
- Share ownership
- Multi-Units ownership
- Institutional Sector of the establishment
- Type of Ownership of the establishment
- Main Industry in which the establishment operates
- Principal lines of services offered
- Turnover
- Number of persons engaged by the establishment
- Wages/salaries and other benefits
Coverage
National coverage
All establishments operating in Zimbabwe.
Producers and sponsors
| Name | Affiliation |
|---|---|
| Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency | Ministry of Finance and Economic Development |
| Name | Role |
|---|---|
| Strategic Economic Research and Analysis - United States Agency for International Development | Financial assistance |
| Name | Role |
|---|---|
| United Nations Development Programme | Financial assistance |
Survey instrument
In conducting the CBR inquiry, the bottom-up approach was used whereby field staff administered the CBR questionnaire to all establishments that were on the master list. The master list was an amalgamation of registers from ZIMSTAT, local authorities NSSA and business associations. In addition, establishments that were not on the master list but found on the ground were also covered. The alternative could have been to use the less expensive top-down approach based on ZIMRA tax records. However, the top-down approach could not be used owing to the confidentiality clause in the ZIMRA Act that restricts the Revenue Authority from disclosing individual company tax records.
In the bottom-up approach, all local authorities were requested to provide information on establishments operating under their jurisdictions. ZIMSTAT provided the local authorities with a template showing how the information was to be provided. The template contained variables such as legal and trading names, physical addresses and economic activity among others.
Data collection
| Start | End |
|---|---|
| 2013-08-01 | 2014-06-30 |
| Name |
|---|
| Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency |
Training Workshops
Two training workshops, one for the trainers and one for the enumerators were held in June and October 2012 respectively. The training of trainers was conducted from 17 to 23 June 2012 with the objective of training trainers on concepts and definitions. Four managers, one chief statistician and ten provincial supervisors were trained. Feedback from this workshop was used to modify the survey instruments.
The training of enumerators' workshop was held from 1 to 11 October 2012. A total of seventeen team leaders and one hundred and thirty-three enumerators were trained.
The objectives of the enumerators' training workshop were to:
- To understand survey instruments (that is, concepts and definitions, the questionnaire, enumerator manual) and why the questions or variables were selected
- To pre-test the survey instruments
- To practice conducting the survey
The training course consisted of instructions regarding interviewing techniques, field procedures, and a detailed review of items on the questionnaires, mock interviews between participants, class exercises, tests and remedial exercises to ensure understanding of the survey instruments, concepts and procedures.
Listing of Establishments
Publicity and sensitization of Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing and local authorities was done first. A listing exercise was carried out from December 2012 to February 2013. ZIMSTAT staff collected information from municipalities, town councils, town boards and rural district councils, NSSA and business associations in their respective Provinces.
Merging of Registers
ZIMSTAT has been collecting economic statistics using QEI, CIP, CPS and National Accounts registers. For the purpose of the CBR inquiry, the Agency merged these registers as well as the NSSA register in order to come up with a master list. The Agency then carried out the CBR listing exercise. After the listing exercise, records from the master list were cross checked with those from the listing exercise and where appropriate, the master list was updated or had duplicates removed.
Verification Exercise
The master list was used to verify and update existing establishments throughout the country whereby field staff physically checked establishments on the ground against those on the master list. The establishments that were on the master list but not on the ground were deleted and those on the ground but not on the master list were added. The updated list was used for CBR data collection.
Data Collection
Publicity of the CBR data collection exercise was done at both national level and sub-national in print media. The data collection exercise took 93 days from August 2013 to February 2014 in phases with 133 enumerators and 17 team leaders. CBR questionnaires were administered to listed establishments and also new ones found on the ground.
The target population during the CBR exercise were all establishments registered or licensed by any arm of government, that is, registrar of companies, local authorities and the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority and engaged in economic activities as classified by the International Standard Industrial Classification of all Economic Activities (ISIC) Revision 4 in all the Provinces and districts. All establishments operating from a fixed location were also enumerated irrespective of any form of registration.
Data processing
The Project Team as secondary editors complemented the efforts of the data entry supervisors on internal consistency checks. Some of the checks done included:
- Ensuring that the main and secondary economic activities described in the CBR questionnaire were assigned the correct ISIC codes at 4 digit level.
- Ensuring establishments clearly described the economic activities which they are engaged in according to the products or service lines they offered, and this made it easy to determine the industrial class of any economic activity given.
- When recovering CBR questionnaires from establishments, ZIMSTAT enumerators would ensure that the economic activities were described in not less than two words.
- The CBR editing/coding team was issued with some editing and coding instructions which included some ISIC Rev. 4 coding manuals. The International Standard Industrial Classification of all economic activities (ISIC) Revision 4 coding manuals have some mutually exclusive categories at the highest level called sections which are alphabetically coded A to U:
- Where the description of the economic activity was not clear, the CBR editor/coder would make some follow-ups by making phone calls where details were provided.
- Checking for duplicate serial numbers, duplication of establishments, i.e. serial numbers versus unique identification codes.
- Identify the corporate structure of enterprises and their respective establishments, i.e. enterprise profiling. All establishments belonging to an enterprise were determined using the names and physical addresses. Establishments that belong to the same enterprise have been linked using names and addresses, (the bottom up approach) and assigning numbers to them. What is required now is to do further profiling. It is after profiling that we can update the database and the quality of establishment level reporting improved.
- Checking of typographical errors that might cause noise in the data.
- Checking for missing serial numbers that may result in omissions.
Data appraisal
A series of data quality tables and graphs are available to review the quality of the data and include the following:
• Number and Percent Distribution of Establishments by Province
• Number and Percent Distribution of Establishments by Industry according to the International Standard Industrial Classification of All Economic Activities (ISIC) Rev 4.
• Number and Percent Distribution of Establishments by Employment Size
• Number of Establishments by Age
• Number and Percent Distribution of Employees by Province
• Value and Percent Distribution of Salaries, Wages and Allowances by Province
• Number of Establishments by Employment size and Annual Turnover (US$)
• Number and Percent Distribution of Establishments by Majority Share Ownership and Type of Ownership
• Number of New Establishments by Industry
Data Access
| Name | URL | |
|---|---|---|
| Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency | www.zimstat.co.zw | info@zimstat.co.zw |
Disclaimer and copyrights
(c) Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZIMSTAT)
Contacts
| Name | Affiliation | |
|---|---|---|
| Manager, Statistics Databases Branch | Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency | cbr@zimstat.co.zw |
Metadata production
DDI_ZWE_2013_CBR_v01_M
| Name | Affiliation | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency | Ministry of Finance and Economic Development | Documentation of the study |
| Development Economics Data Group | The World Bank | Review of the metadata |
2014-11-30
Metadata version
Version 02 (August 2021). Identical to a DDI published on Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZIMSTAT) microdata catalog. Some of the metadata fields have been edited.