5. 6.98 Official Journal of the European Communities L 162/1 (Acts whose publication is obligatory) COUNCIL REGULATION (EC) No 1165/98 of 19 May 1998 concerning short-term statistics THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION, Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community, and in particular Article 213 thereof, Having regard to the draft Regulation submitted by the Commission ('), Having regard to the opinion of the European Par- liament (?), Having regard to the opinion of the Economic and Social Committee (%), Having regard to the opinion of the European Monetary Institute (%), (1) Whereas Council Directive 72/211/EEC of 30 May 1972 concerning coordinated statistics on the busi- ness cycle in industry and small craft industries (°) and Council Directive 78/166/EEC of 13 February 1978 concerning coordinated statistics on the busi- ness cycle in building and civil engineering (°) which aimed to provide a body of coherent statistics, have not been able to take account of economic and tech- nical changes; (2) Whereas the European Union has in the meantime made further progress towards integration; whereas new economic, competition, social, environmental and enterprise policies and guidelines call for initi- atives and decisions based on valid statistics; whereas the information provided for under existing Com- munity legislation or available in the various Member States is partly inadequate or insufficiently com- parable to serve as a reliable basis for the work of the Communities; (3) Whereas the future European Central Bank needs rapid short term statistics in order to assess economic development in the Member States in the context of a single European monetary policy; ) ) Opinion delivered on 20 February 1998 (O] C 80, 16.3.1998). % OJ C 19, 21. 1. 1998, p. 125. ) in the Official Journal). %) OJ L 128, 3. 6. 1972, p. 28. °) OJ L 52, 23. 2. 1978, p. 17. (4) Whereas standardisation is required to meet Community needs for information concerning economic convergence; (5) Whereas it is necessary to have reliable and rapid statistics available in order to report on the economic development in each Member State of the Union within the framework of the economic policy of the Union; (6) Whereas businesses and their professional associa- tions need such information in order to understand their markets and to know their activity and perfor- mance relative to their sector, at national and inter- national level; (7) Whereas the compilation of national accounts ac- cording to Council Regulation (EC) No 2223/96 of 25 June 1996 on the European system of national and regional accounts in the Community (") requires the development of comparable, complete and re- liable statistical sources; (8) Whereas by Decision 92/326/EEC (}) the Council adopted a two-year programme (1992 to 1993) for the development of European statistics on services; whereas this programme includes the compilation of harmonised statistics at national and regional levels, particularly for the distributive trades; (9) Whereas in accordance with the principle of subsidi- arity the creation of common statistical norms that permit the production of harmonised statistics is an action which can only be undertaken efficiently at Community level and whereas they will be applied in each Member State under the authority of the bodies and institutions in charge of compiling offi- cial statistics; (10) Whereas the best method of ascertaining the busi- ness cycle consists of compiling statistics which conform to common methodological principles and with common definitions of characteristics; whereas it is only from coordinated compilation that har- monised statistics can be drawn up with reliability, speed, flexibility and the level of detail required to () OJ L 310, 30. 11. 1996, p. 1. () OJ L 179, 1. 7. 1992, p. 131.