Demand for statistics on business demography has grown and developed considerably in recent years. Data on births and deaths of enterprises, their life expectancy and the important role they play in economic growth and productivity, as well as the information they provide for tackling social demographic issues, are increasingly requested by policy makers and analysts alike. Some of these data form part of the Structural Indicators measuring the progress towards the European Union's goals set out in the Growth and Jobs Strategy. In addition, business demography is a core element of the OECD's Entrepreneurship Indicators Project, where the OECD and Eurostat are collaborating to develop a framework for the regular and harmonised measurement of entrepreneurial activity and the factors that enhance or impede it. The OECD Project is supported by a grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, though the contents of this Manual are solely the responsibility of the OECD and Eurostat.