General economic, commercial, and labour affairs (COFOG-A 041)

A1C.63.

General economic, commercial, and labour affairs (COFOG-A 041) consists of government expenditure on general economic, and labour affairs. This category is further classified into:

• general economic and commercial affairs (COFOG-A 0411); and
• general labour affairs (COFOG-A 0412).

A1C.64.

General economic and commercial affairs (COFOG-A 0411) consists of:

• the administration of general economic and commercial affairs and services including general foreign commercial affairs; formulation and implementation of general economic and commercial policies; liaison among different branches of government and between government and business;
• the regulation or support of general economic and commercial activities such as export and import trade as a whole, commodity and equity markets, overall income controls, general trade promotion activities, general regulation of monopolies and other restraints on trade and market entry, etc.; supervision of the banking industry;
• the operation or support of institutions dealing with patents, trademarks, copyrights, company registration, weather forecasting, standards, hydrologic surveys, geodesic surveys, etc.; and
• grants, loans or subsidies to promote general economic and commercial policies and programs.

Includes: Consumer education and protection; foreign trade offices.

Excludes: Economic and commercial affairs of a particular industry (classified to COFOG-A 042, COFOG-A 043, COFOG-A 044, COFOG-A 045, COFOG-A 046 or COFOG-A 11).

A1C.65.

General labour affairs (COFOG-A 0412) consists of:

• the administration of general labour affairs and services; formulation and implementation of general labour policies; supervision and regulation of labour conditions (hours of work, wages, safety, etc.); liaison among different branches of government and between government and overall industrial, business and labour organisations;
• the operation or support of general programs or schemes to facilitate labour mobility, to reduce sex, race, age and other discrimination, to reduce the rate of unemployment in distressed or underdeveloped regions, to promote the employment of disadvantaged or other groups characterised by high unemployment rates, etc.; operation of labour exchanges; operation or support of arbitration and mediation services;
• the production and dissemination of general information, technical documentation and statistics on general labour affairs and services; and
• grants, loans or subsidies to promote general labour policies and programs.

Includes: Operation or support of conciliation services; operation of employment offices; schemes to promote employment that cannot be allocated to specific industries; Community Development Employment Projects (CDEP) program; Remote Jobs and Communities Program (RJCP); other programs in which general labour affairs is the main component.

Excludes: Labour affairs of a particular industry (classified to COFOG-A 042, COFOG-A 043, COFOG-A 044, COFOG-A 045, COFOG-A 046 or COFOG-A 11); provision of social protection in the form of cash benefits and benefits in kind to people who are unemployed (classified to unemployment (COFOG-A 1041)); vocational training (classified to vocational education and training (excluding apprenticeships and traineeships) (COFOG-A 0932)); the Community Development Employment Program (classified to indigenous community development (COFOG-A 0621) or community development not elsewhere classified (COFOG-A 0629)).