Overview of Linkroles in ESEF Taxonomy
ESEF Taxonomy 2021 is published 30 November 2021. In ESEF taxonomy there are multiple extended link roles (ELR) which will be later referred to as linkroles.
In XBRL there are three different terms with the name "role". The most important one when finding the right elements to be mapped is the linkrole. A linkrole contains hierarchies of elements. The other two are resource roles, and arc roles. Label roles (e.g. standard label, total label) are resource roles whereas wider-narrower is an arc role used to define an anchoring relationship.
In ESEF taxonomy, many labels are typically defined for the same line item in one language. The standard label and documentation label are the most important ones. There are sometimes also other label roles used for elements such as total labels. Whether to use the total label in this position in the Extension sheet of the ESEF report is, however, dependent on the wording in the entry sheet. If the line on the entry sheet states "Total equity" instead of "Equity", it is recommended to use Total as the preferred label role (PreferredLabel column).
In a taxonomy the linkroles are the highest grouping level of line items. They contain hierarchies in different XBRL linkbases. One linkrole typically contains both the presentation and the calculation hierarchy. Sometimes there are also multiple calculation hierarchies for the same presentation format. Multiple calculation hierarchies cannot be used in extension taxonomy. The purpose of the calculation and presentation hierarchies in the ESEF Taxonomy linkroles is solely to be an example. The shape of the extension taxonomy of the report always depends on the shape of the entry sheets and the XHTML report, not on the shape of the ESEF Taxonomy.
In ESEF taxonomy linkroles are used to classify the line items and domain members for different statements and notes. When you as a reporter open the taxonomy, review the presentation hierarchies first.
In ESEF taxonomy 2021 there are 67 linkroles. In practice, one primary financial statement could consist of elements from multiple linkroles. For example, the statement of financial position could use elements from linkroles "[210000] Statement of financial position, current/non-current" and "[800100] Notes - Subclassifications of assets, liabilities and equities".
List of linkroles in ESEF Taxonomy 2021
The following list includes all linkroles which are available in the ESEF taxonomy relationships entry point of 2021 taxonomy. The linkroles are grouped according to the primary financial statements.
Mandatory elements (10 first in list for 2020 & 2021 AFR)
[000000] Tags that must be applied if corresponding information is present in a report
Statement of financial position
[210000] Statement of financial position, current/non-current
[220000] Statement of financial position, order of liquidity
[800100] Subclassifications of assets, liabilities and equities
Statement of profit or loss and other comprehensive income
[310000] Statement of comprehensive income, profit or loss, by function of expense
[320000] Statement of comprehensive income, profit or loss, by nature of expense
[410000] Statement of comprehensive income, OCI components presented net of tax
[420000] Statement of comprehensive income, OCI components presented before tax
[800200] Analysis of income and expense
Statement of changes in equity
[610000] Statement of changes in equity
[710000] Statement of changes in net assets available for benefits
[800400] Statement of changes in equity, additional disclosures
Statement of cash flows
[510000] Statement of cash flows, direct method
[520000] Statement of cash flows, indirect method
[800300] Statement of cash flows, additional disclosures
Other linkroles
[110000] General information about financial statements
[800500] List of notes
[800600] List of accounting policies
[810000–880000] Notes (41 linkroles)
[901000] Axis - Retrospective application and retrospective restatement
[901100] Axis - Departure from requirement of IFRS
[901500] Axis - Creation date
[903000] Axis - Continuing and discontinued operations
[904000] Axis - Assets and liabilities classified as held for sale
[913000] Axis - Consolidated and separate financial statements
[914000] Axis - Currency in which information is displayed
[915000] Axis - Cumulative effect at date of initial application
The reporter is expected to form reporting entity-specific hierarchies from the linkroles based on the line items reported in the annual financial reports. The extension taxonomy (Extension sheet) should not contain any elements which are not used in the financial statement in practice (i.e. referred to on the Mapping sheet). The root role should be used as the basis for the form of the hierarchy and elements may be embedded from the supporting linkroles. If there are no fitting elements even in the supporting roles or other roles in the taxonomy, an extension element should be created.
The last six linkroles 901000915000 contain "by application" axes. These are additional axes which can be used to separate facts on the iXBRL report. They can be connected to extension element tables. Some of these axes are already present in the tables where they are commonly used.
The content of these linkroles can be examined by viewing the taxonomy workbook. See Using ESEF_taxonomy_YYYY_LL_ERT.xlsx. This workbook has been designed specifically for ESEF Reporting Tool. Taxonomies can also be viewed using a separate browser-based taxonomy viewer, such as CoreFiling Bigfoot Taxonomy Library. Taxonomy viewer makes it possible to view ESEF taxonomy in all EU languages (23) and makes it easy to view the reference of IFRS standard for each taxonomy element. The elements and content of next year's IFRS taxonomy can also be viewed.