Stats NZ delays GDP release by another week

Stats NZ delays March qtr GDP figures by a week to ensure it has properly accounted for quake effects; Now due July 14

6th Jul 11, 4:25pm by Alex Tarrant

The release of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) figures for the March quarter has been delayed for a week as Statistics New Zealand ensures its methods for measuring GDP have adequately accounted for the Christchurch earthquakes.

The release was due tomorrow, and has been moved to Thursday, July 14 at 10:45am.

A Reuters survey of economists pointed to GDP rising 0.4% in the March quarter, while Treasury and the Reserve Bank are tipping a 0.3% rise in the three months to March from the December quarter.

See the announcement from Stats NZ:

Statistics New Zealand has delayed the release of the Gross Domestic Product: March 2011 quarter (GDP) information release until Thursday, 14 July.

GDP was due to be released on Thursday, 7 July but more time is needed to analyse the data.

Statistics NZ previously announced that the release of the March quarter GDP would be delayed from 23 June until 7 July. We needed this extra time to ensure that our methods for measuring GDP adequately accounted for the Canterbury earthquakes, and to get supplementary data for the March quarter release.

The quality assurance work for the March quarter has taken longer than expected and we have now decided that another week is required to ensure the quality of the results.

"We regret the inconvenience to people who use GDP information," Colin Lynch, Deputy Government Statistician for macro-economic and environment statistics said.

"Statistics New Zealand is committed to providing timely information. Because of this, the results of GDP are finalised very close to the release date. In this case, it means we have had to make the decision to postpone close to the scheduled release date."

Given the sensitivity of GDP data and the stage of analysis, Statistics NZ will not make any further public comment before the release on 14 July.

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2 Comments

by Sepherial | 6th Jul 11, 5:37pm 1309930640

There outta ideas perhaps?

...the equations of make believe dont quite make sense even to them?

...who really knows?

Whoa people actually still believe GDP hype is relevent ?

The benchmark of GDP is going the way of growth which is where the dinosaurs went - extinct!

by Chris_J | 8th Jul 11, 11:41pm 1310125267

"...to ensure it has properly accounted for quake effects" :

ie the GDP figure we calculated was so far below expectations we MUST have made a mistake!

Let me guess: March GDP came out of the calculator as -1.5% and a revision of December quarter to -0.2% means we have actually been in recession for three quarters. So now they are desperately looking for ways to "make adjustments" to get it to at least something that is ok with their overlords (Bill E, Bolly and other Key people).

So next week we will see GDP figures something like -0.5% in March and +0.1% in December with the real figures hidden and buried, never to be spoken of again.

Of course this means we technically escaped recession! Thank you Bill E and Bolly for your good work! It's amazing how flexible those statistics are!

Do we get to see the raw data? No never! That's far too complicated with all of the quake effects!