THE SEX and drug trades were among illegal activities that boosted Spain’s annual output by nearly e10 billion (R142bn), official data revealed yesterday.
The figures came in a report by the country’s National Statistics Institute, which for the first time applied new EU norms requiring illegal activities to be counted in estimates of gross domestic product (GDP).
The institute estimated that in 2010, illicit activities, principally prostitution and drug crimes, but also tobacco smuggling and gambling, accounted for 0.87 percent of the economy – equal to e9.4bn.
Once production was recalculated using the new norms, Spain’s GDP last year was more than e26bn higher than previously estimated at e1.05 trillion overall, the institute said.
That new figure included illegal activity but also other legal sources of income that were previously excluded from the calculation, such as military assets and research investment.
The institute said it had consulted “academic and scientific studies” and official reports and surveys to estimate income from illegal activities, in line with the norms of EU agency Eurostat.
“The government has no problem doing this, technical or otherwise,” an official in the economy ministry who asked not to be named said. “It is a matter of applying a decision by Eurostat, which was made to harmonise calculation methods” across EU countries. – Sapa-AFP