How did later sections shift one letter?

Later sections shifted one letter because the split of former Section J added one section in the middle of the alphabet, pushing every following section one letter later. 2 has become section L in NACE Rev. 2.1. Table 4 in the manual presents the full comparison between the sections of the two versions, so that each old letter can be matched to its new letter and its heading.

What does Table 4 show, letter by letter?

Table 4 shows sections A to I unchanged in letter and heading, with one heading change at section G, where the words repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles were removed from the heading. It then shows former Section J split into new Sections J and K, with new headings for each. From there, each following section shifts one letter: former K becomes L, former L becomes M, former M becomes N, former N becomes O, former O becomes P, former P becomes Q, former Q becomes R, former R becomes S, former S becomes T, former T becomes U, and former U becomes V. The headings for those shifted sections stay the same in substance, with one renaming: former Section R for arts, entertainment and recreation becomes Section S for arts, sports and recreation.

The manual confirms the shift in the individual passages for each shifted section. Each passage states that the section has been renamed to the next letter, for example that NACE Rev. 2 Section K has been renamed to Section L, and that NACE Rev. 2 Section U has been renamed to Section V. Those passages are short, because the shift itself is the change at section level for those sections. Changes inside the sections, at division, group and class level, are listed separately in the same passages, and must not be confused with the letter shift.

NACE Rev. 2 section	NACE Rev. 2.1 section	Heading in NACE Rev. 2.1
K	L	Financial and insurance activities
L	M	Real estate activities
M	N	Professional, scientific and technical activities
N	O	Administrative and support service activities
O	P	Public administration and defence, compulsory social security
P	Q	Education
Q	R	Human health and social work activities
R	S	Arts, sports and recreation
S	T	Other service activities
T	U	Activities of households as employers and undifferentiated goods and service producing activities of households for own use
U	V	Activities of extraterritorial organisations and bodies

Why does the shift matter for reading old tables?

The shift matters because a section letter on its own does not identify a field without a version. Section K in NACE Rev. 2 means financial and insurance activities. Section K in NACE Rev. 2.1 means telecommunication, computer programming, consulting, computing infrastructure and other information service activities. Section L in NACE Rev. 2 means real estate activities, while Section L in NACE Rev. 2.1 means financial and insurance activities. A reader who copies a letter from an old table into a new table, or who searches a new dataset by an old letter, will retrieve the wrong field for every section after the split.

The EUR-Lex summary lists the 22 sections of NACE Rev. 2.1 in order, without letters, and the manual structure table gives the letters for the new version. A reader who needs to convert a letter must use Table 4, not memory, and must state the version for both the old and the new letter. A conversion stated as former K to new L is complete. A conversion stated as K to L without versions is ambiguous, because the direction and the versions are not stated.

What stayed the same inside the shifted sections?

Inside the shifted sections, much stayed the same at section level, and change was concentrated at lower levels. The manual passages for the shifted sections list the lower level changes separately: splits and mergers of classes, creation of new groups, moves of classes between groups, and restructurings of divisions. For example, the passage for the new Section L lists the split of group 64.2 and group 64.3 into new classes, while the passage for the new Section T lists the merger of repair classes and the restructuring of division 96. Those lower level changes are the substantive changes inside the sections. The letter shift is a recoding consequence of the split, not a substantive change to the field covered by each shifted section.

One heading change inside the shift deserves a separate note. The former Section R heading, arts, entertainment and recreation, becomes arts, sports and recreation in the new Section S. The manual states the new heading in Table 4 and in the passage for the section. The change in the heading word from entertainment to sports reflects the restructuring of divisions 90 and 91 inside the section, which is listed in the same passage. The heading change and the restructuring must be read together, and neither must be read as a change to the whole section beyond what the passage lists.

What does the shift not decide?

The shift does not decide the class for an activity, and it does not decide an entry for a business. It changes the letter that identifies a section in the new structure. The classes inside a shifted section may have stayed the same, split, merged, or moved, and each class move must be traced in the correspondence table. The explanatory notes for the new classes state what each includes and excludes. The institute or register that holds the record confirms an entry. A reader who has converted a section letter correctly has taken one step in reading the new structure. That reader must still trace the class.

Use Table 4 to convert each section letter, read the manual passage for the section to see the lower level changes, and confirm any entry with the national statistical institute or the business register that holds the record.