Project 1.2.5: ISF

Project Team

Prof. René Belderbos (project leader), Vincent van Roy and Florence Duvivier

Content

The ISF database is a longitudinal database with yearly financial accounts of Flemish firms, based on Belfirst. The database contains firms: 1) with headquarters in Flanders or the Brussels Capital Region 2) active in industrial sectors or service sectors 3) with at least one employee. The database includes identification variables (name, industry code, VAT number, postal code, etc) and yearly data from the financial reports such as fixed assets, profit, return on assets, sales, cost of sales, employees, directors, ownership and subsidiaries. The database is used to address research questions on growth and productivity by linking information at the firm level with several other databases. An additional advantage of the broad coverage of the data is that growth and productivity can also be depicted with reasonable reliability at the industry level for Flanders, allowing measurement of relative performance.

Methodology

In 2007 the database has been extended with an update based on new Belfirst editions (2004-2005). Currently the database is fully developed for the years 1996-2005. In 2008 another update will take place for the year 2006. Data on existing firms will be updated, and newly established firms or firms with first-time reporting requirements will be identified. The data will be checked for consistency and cleaned. The data will then be linked to the Flemish CIS Survey.