Abstract

There is growing interest at Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) to use administrative data to produce official statistics. The demand for timeous and immediately available data by users is also starting to grow in South Africa. This demand creates an opportunity to save costs in statistical production and reduce response burden but presents numerous technical, capacity, and methodological challenges for Statistics South Africa (Stats SA).Linkages of administrative data sets with survey data promise a new frontier in the production of official statistics. This study examines the potential for the use of administrative data obtained from the Companies and intellectual Property Commission (CIPC) for collecting and compiling financial statistics that are currently produced at Stats SA by means of the Annual Financial Statistics (AFS) survey. The first part of this study deals with the time series analysis of the data from both sources and the second part with an in depth case analysis of the matching units from the AFS and CIPC database. The research presents an analysis of the numerous challenges encountered when comparing the data from both sources and makes some recommendations on the way forward.