Canadian System of Environmental-Economic Accounts - Natural Resource Asset Accounts (NRAA)
Summary of changes
Activity on this program started: 1997
Reference period of change - 2012
As of reference year 2012, data for the Natural Resource Stock Accounts program have been revised to reflect a number of methodological changes. Changes apply to the entire time series, from 1961 onwards for energy resource, mineral resources and timber. Details are presented below.
Firstly, in order to align with the new international standard for environmental accounting, the System of Environmental Economic Accounting 2012 (SEEA 2012), Monetary Natural Resource Stock Accounts estimates published in CANSIM now incorporate a positive return to the produced capital employed in the extraction of resources. The return to produced capital is estimated using a variable rate of return derived from real (inflation adjusted) rates of return on long-term Government of Canada bonds; the rate of return is applied to the value of produced capital employed in the extraction of resources net of depreciation.
Secondly, a geometric method of depreciation of capital employed in extraction of resources (rather than a linear method) is now used in the calculation of the depreciation component of the cost of produced capital associated with the extraction of natural resources. This change is required to reflect a similar change introduced in 2012 in the National Balance Sheet Account.
Thirdly, estimates of the value of timber assets are no longer published as a 5-year moving average. While this change leads to greater volatility of timber asset values, it brings greater coherence between timber asset values and the value of subsoil assets (i.e., mineral and energy resources), which are not based on moving averages.
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