Use of public data sources to increase the accuracy and completeness of the EuroGroups Register

The EuroGroups Register (EGR) is the European statistical business register on multinational enterprise (MNE) groups developed by the European Statistical System and managed by Eurostat. Primarily sourced by the National Statistical Institutes (NSIs) of the European Union (EU) and European Free Trade Association (EFTA) countries, alongside a commercial data provider, the EGR is the authoritative source for producing consistent globalisation statistics in the EU-EFTA. Since demand for EGR data is rising, there is a need to address data gaps, specifically in economic variables. Improving the EGR’s accuracy and completeness will boost its utility as the authoritative source for MNE group statistics. At the Conference on New Techniques and Technologies for Statistics 2023, Eurostat presented a feasibility study which responded positively to the question of whether there is value in using public sources as a potential source to enrich the EGR’s data. This paper outlines the systematic process of choosing, evaluating and using public data sources before integrating them into the EGR, their application in producing EGR data, and the resulting improvement in the EGR’s data quality.