Panama

Title of the survey

Encuesta de Industria Manufacturera (Survey of Manufacturing)

Organization responsible

Dirección de Estadística y Censo, Sección de Encuestas Económicas.

Periodicity of the survey

Annual.

Objectives of the survey

To provide the various users with information on the principal economic characteristics of establishments engaged in manufacturing, which will permit an analysis of the structure and development of the industry. The results provide an estimate of more than 90 per cent of the gross national product of manufacturing, and are used for various plans for economic development and analysis.

Main labour topics covered by the survey

Employment and compensation of employees; output, sales and other income.

Reference period

The calendar year or the taxation period of the establishment. Employment: the working day nearest to the last day of February, May, August and November of each year. Compensation of Employees: the whole year.

Coverage of the survey

Geographical

The whole country.

Industrial

Manufacturing.

Establishments

Establishments with five or more persons employed, in the public and private sectors.

Persons

All persons employed.

Occupations

Information by occupation is not collected.

Concepts and definitions

Employment

Persons employed refer to all persons who, during the pay period nearest to the last day of each reference month, were working, whether for payment or not, for the establishment. They include employed persons on short-term leave of absence, such as sick leave, occasional leave or paid vacation, and persons on strike. They exclude home workers, persons on indefinite leave of absence, retired persons and unpaid apprentices, together with accountants and persons providing the establishment with other professional or legal services (lawyers, engineers, etc.) who do not perform their functions within the establishment or, if they do so, work for less than one-third of the working day, even though they may be on the payroll. Information is requested on five categories of persons employed:

working proprietors who do not receive a fixed wage,
unpaid family workers and other unpaid workers who work in the establishment for at least one-third of the normal working day,
three categories of employees: administrative and office workers, professional and technical workers, operatives and manual workers, sales workers, drivers, workers providing professional services who work for the establishment for a regular wage or salary or on commission and who are present on the payroll during the pay period nearest to the last day of each reference month. They also include paid family workers. Information is requested separately on:
- administrative workers: managers and directors working for a salary, administrative workers, typists, clerks, accountants, sales workers, dispatch workers, and other office employees,
- technical workers: persons with specialized knowledge or training, such as skilled workers in laboratory work, with machinery, industrial engineers, etc.; office employees,
- operatives and manual workers: persons engaged in activities directly connected with the process of production of goods and services or on tasks directly ancillary to this process from the moment when the materials enter the establishment until the products are dispatched.

The number of working proprietors and family workers and other unpaid workers is requested only on 31 August. The number of employees (by category) and other employed persons, by sex, is requested only on 31 August.

Compensation of employees

Information is requested on payment, whether in cash or in kind, made by the employer during the reference year, for the work performed by employees. For each of the occupational categories of employees, information is requested on:

wages and salaries in cash and in kind: include wages and salaries in the form of goods, work clothing, lodging, etc.; payment of commissions, vacation pay and sick leave. They refer to gross wages and salaries, i.e. before deduction of workers' contributions to the social security fund, income tax and other compulsory deductions;
other remuneration: includes premiums, profit-sharing bonuses, year-end bonuses, redundancy pay, representation expenses, 13th-month bonus, paid during the reference year;
supplementary labour cost: include employers' contributions to the social security fund and other benefits such as family allowances, medical services, maternity allowances and educational insurance paid by employers during the reference year.

Hours of work

Not relevant.

International recommendations

The concept of compensation of employees meets the recommendations of the United Nations on industrial statistics and the System of National Accounts. It is also very close to the concept of labour costs, except that it excludes costs of workers' housing, borne by the employer.

Classifications

Components of labour cost / compensation of employees

According to the following groups of components:

gross wages and salaries,
other remuneration:
- commission paid to employees,
- 13-month bonus,
- premiums, year-end bonuses, profit-sharing bonuses and representation expenses,
- allowances,
- separation pay,
- seniority bonuses,
employers' contributions and other social benefits:
- social security,
- educational insurance,
- occupational accidents,
- other benefits.

Industrial

The Clasificación Industrial Nacional Uniforme of 1969 is used, based on the International Standard Industrial Classification of all economic activities (ISIC), Rev.2, 1968, in which 81 groups of activity are distinguished. Since the 1990 survey, ISIC, Rev. 3, 1990 has been used.

Occupational

Not relevant.

Others

According to the three occupational categories of employees.

Sample size and design

Statistical unit

The sampling unit is the manufacturing establishment, i.e. an establishment (factory, workshop, etc.) which operates as an independent unit under a single administration, usually in one place, the activities of which are under separate accounting and where a product or homogeneous group of products or goods is produced, converted, refined or extracted.

Survey universe / sample frame

The frame used is the list of establishments by class of economic activity (at a four-digit level), obtained from the results of the Vth national economic census carried out in 1992.

Sample design

The survey covers 49 branches of economic activity, of which 33 are surveyed by a complete enumeration of establishments with five or more workers, and 16 by sampling. In the 16 branches sampled, simple random sampling is used with stratification according to total income, with heterogeneous sampling fractions by branch of activity. 384 establishments were selected: 242 in stratum I (sample fraction 1/1) and 142 in stratum II using systematic sampling. Approximately 46 per cent of the total number of establishments was selected, which, added to the branches which are completely enumerated, represent about 62 per cent of the survey universe.

Field work

Data collection

This takes place every year between April and June, with respect to the preceding year, by means of personal interviews with enumerators.

Survey questionnaire

The first part (location and data on the establishment) is used to update the directory of establishments. The questionnaire comprises 13 sections and the data on employment and compensation of employees form part of the industrial information requested (stocks, general expenses, fixed assets, operating costs, output and sales, purchase of raw materials, distribution of profits, balance sheet, electric energy, etc.). Instructions regarding definitions, inclusions and exclusions form part of the questionnaire. There is also an instruction manual for the enumerators.

Substitution of sampling units

None.

Data processing and editing

The data are processed by computer. All the data have a source code assigned in the questionnaire, except for the data on raw material and finished products. If data are missing or inconsistent, the establishments are visited again for the purpose of checking, and if data are missing because of non-response, they are imputed. Checks of totals, inconsistencies and coefficients are carried out.

Types of estimates

Total of persons employed, totals and averages of compensation of employees (the gross domestic product of the industry and its production account are also estimated). Averages are obtained by dividing total compensation of employees by the corresponding number of persons employed (up to 1988) and by the corresponding number of employees (since 1989).

Construction of indices

None.

Weighting of sample results

An expansion factor is calculated as a ratio, in order to raise the results of the sample on total income, general expenses, stocks, etc.

Adjustments

Non-response

Adjustment factors are calculated in the case of non-response.

Other bias

None.

Use of benchmark data

Not relevant.

Use of other surveys

Not relevant.

Indicators of reliability of the estimates

Coverage of the sampling frame

The 1992 economic census is used as the sampling frame.

Sampling error / sampling variance

Calculations are pending.

Non-response rate

This stands at approximately two per cent, i.e. between 10 and 15 of the survey units.

Non-sampling errors

False information or information which does not conform to the requirements of the definitions.

Conformity with other sources

Various sources of data are used to check the reliability of the results:

the household survey, for the number of persons employed,
the economic indicators, for employment, compensation of employees and sales,
the food balance sheet, for the use and source of supply of manufactured foodstuffs.

Estimates for non-survey years

Not relevant.

Available series

Characteristics of the establishments according to activity group, ownership of the capital, province, type of legal organization in law, value of sales, level of employment, etc.,
persons employed and number of employees, by occupational category according to branch of activity and sex on 31 August of each year,
compensation paid and supplementary labour costs (compensation of employees) by occupational category according to branch of activity,
other industrial statistics.

History of the survey

The Survey of Manufacturing began in 1956.

Documentation

Dirección de Estadística y Censo: Estadística Panameña (Panama, annual). The delay between the survey reference period and the publication of the results is about four months. The results can also be supplied on diskette.

Confidentiality / Reliability criteria

The provisions of Article 8 of the statistics law in force guarantee the confidential nature of individual data. On the other hand, in order to ensure the reliability of the results, data are not submitted from fewer than three informants.

Other information

Data supplied to the ILO for publication

Data are published in the Yearbook of Labour Statistics on:

employment (persons engaged) in manufacturing, in Tables 5A and 5B,
average compensation of employees per person and per year in manufacturing, in Tables 22A and 22B.