Quarterly, published eight weeks after the reference quarter
National level
440 - Transport, tourism and ICT statistics
The Statistics Act § 2-1 (voluntary)
Council Directive 95/57/EC of 23 November 1995 on the collection of statistical information in the field of tourism.
Eurostat
The purpose is to throw light on Norwegians travel habits in Norway and abroad. The survey is carried through from 2002, and on quarterly basis.
Figures published prior to 2002 have been removed from the archive on http://www.ssb.no/english/subjects/00/02/20/reise_en/ due to errors.
The statistics is used by the Innovation Norway (former Norwegian Tourist Board), organisations within the trade, Research Institutes and International organisations like Eurostat.
Statistics covers a sample of the Norwegian population in the age group 16 - 79 years, and their trips lasting at least 1 night, independent of the purpose of the trip.
The Population register in combination with telephone interview/CATI.
The holiday survey is carried out among 2 000 Norwegians between 16 and 79 years of age. New sample is drawn every quarter.
Interview (telephone)/CATI
A computer is used during the interview. The interviewer reads the questions aloud from the screen and the answers are registered instantly. This allows the data to be controlled immediately, and it reduces the risk of asking the interviewee wrong questions.
The data is meant to represent the whole Norwegian population in the age group 16-79 years, not only the sample. In order to calculate totals, the data is grouped in four age groups (16-24 years, 25-44 years, 45-66 years and 67-79 years) and sex. Variables like number of tourists, number of trips, number of overnights stops and tourist expenditure is multiplied by a factor, which is define as the size of the population in the current strata divided by number of respondents in the same strata.
Not relevant.
Trip is stay outside the ordinary place of residence independent the purpose of the stay and minimum 1 night duration.
''Overnight stay**. If one has spent the night somewhere it is defined as an overnight stay whether one has slept or not.
The expenditure is defined as the total consumption expenditure made by a visitor or on behalf of a visitor for and during his/her trip and stay at destination. The expenditure includes all taxes paid.
The main destination is defined as the place one has stayed the most nights. If the person has spent an equal number of nights more places, the first place is chosen as the main destination.
Quarter. For 2002 and 2003 there were difference between the quarters investigated and "calendar quarters":
1st quarter: November, December and January. 2nd quarter: February, March and April. 3rd quarter: May, June and July. 4th quarter: August, September and October.
For 2002 and 2003 the quarters investigated are converted into quarters according the calendar.
Not relevant.
Collection errors, like when the interviewee gives incorrect information, or processing errors, like when the interviewer registers the answer incorrectly, are tried kept to a minimum by automatically controlling the answers during the interview. Nevertheless, there may still be some errors left. The number and kind of errors are not known.
Non response errors are errors caused by unit non-response, i.e. that the unit (for instance an individual or a company) has failed to respond, or item non response, i.e. that the unit has failed to respond to some but not all the questions in the survey.
Sampling bias may arise when the distribution of some variables in the sample is not the same as the corresponding distribution in the population.
The results in this survey are based on the information provided by those responding. Non-response is mainly due to the interviewee not wanting to participate or that he/she was not reached by the interviewer. If the interviewee was not reached due to he/she being on holiday, the distribution of this variable among those interviewed and the non-respondents may differ and sampling bias may arise.
Variance. The holiday survey is carried out among a sample of Norwegians between 16 and 79 years of age. The uncertainty of findings based on only a part of the population, (sampling variance) depends among other factors on the number of observations in the sample and on the distribution of the current variable in the whole population. An estimate of this uncertainty (standard deviation) can be constructed by means of the observations in the sample.
In 2002 and 2003 the definition of quarters did not correspond to calendar quarters. However, calendar quarter is published.
Data for each quarter in Travel Survey in 2002 and 2003 is therefore collected from two different surveys. F.eks. 1st quarter 2003 has data both for the period November 2002 - January 2003 concerning the tourists in January 2003, and for the period February - April 2003 concerning the tourists in February and Mars.
Adding up the number of tourists from two different surveys like that, gives an overestimated result, since it is not taken into consideration that many travel twice or more. By certain assumption, the number of tourists is reduced.
Travel Survey was established in 2002 and carried out on quarterly basis since then. The definition of quarters was changed and adapted to the calendar quarters in 2004. These changes have probably not caused lack of comparability.
The Travel Survey covers all types of trips (both holiday trips and trips with occupational purpose) with at least 1 overnight stay, while Holiday Survey covers all holiday trips with at least 4 overnight stays. Both surveys cover long holiday trips and in that way overlap each other
Travel Survey is published on http://www.ssb.no/english/subjects/00/02/20/reise_en/, see link to the StatBank in left column, which gives possibilities to make own tables.
Documentation report for Travel Survey (in Norwegian only) is published http://www.ssb.no/vis/omssb/oppdrag/omnibus.html
Not relevant.
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