ESCAP Capacity Screening for Economic Statistics

Zeynep Orhun Girard Statistician, United Nations ESCAP

ESCAP-Eurostat High-Level Seminar on Tools for Building Efficient and Sustainable National Statistical Systems

13-14 December, Bangkok

• This presentation discusses…

Purpose and background of the Capacity Screening for Economic Statistics

Structure of 2013 Capacity Screening tool

Process for its development including ongoing revisions for Round II in 2017

Success criteria for the Capacity Screening exercise

Uses of the results for and beyond economic statistics

Purpose:

• Capture summary information on national capacity of statistical systems in A-P for producing and disseminating economic statistics

• Inform stakeholders (international/national) of capacity gaps and resources to channel support where it is most needed

Capacity Screening is at the core of monitoring the implementation of the Regional Programme on Economic Statistics (RPES)

RPES is a regional framework for economic statistics capacity building guided by the “Steering Group”

• RPES is 4 outputs or “strategic interventions…” ...to deliver our common vision...

...and reach our key goal of RPES

Advocacy Coordination

Skills Infrastructure

Advocacy

Infrastructure

NSSs in Asia-Pacific have capacity to produce & disseminate the Core Set in

line with international standards, including in support of SDG monitoring

Improved soundness of economic analysis & decision making through increased availability and effective

use of timely, reliable and comparable economic statistics

The Core Set of Economic Statistics gives the substantive scope to RPES

Prices and costs

Demand & output

Income & wealth

Money & banking

Government

Labour market

Natural resources & environment

• Consumer, producer, product price indices, labour cost, wages, exchange rates, PPPs, terms of trade

• GDP (p/e), external trade, industrial structure statistics; short-term indicators (industry output/demand) and productivity

• Public revenue, expenditure, borrowing and lending, government accounts

• Labour supply & demand, LF characteristics, employment & unemployment, underemployment, hours worked, employment in informal & formal sector, job creation, vacancies

• Assets and liabilities of banking sector, monetary measures and interest rates

• NA for economy/by sector to measure income, savings, investment, wealth; BoP to measure international income and capital flows, IIP and external debt

• Measures of sustainable economic growth, discovery/depletion and degradation of natural assets

CS questionnaire scans institutional and technical capacity for economic statistics • Technical cooperation (ongoing/planned initiatives and

interest in RPES)

• Institutional setting (legislation, statistical planning, coordination, dissemination and advocacy)

• IT and Human resources (adequacy of IT infrastructure, number/skills of staff)

• Statistical infrastructure (QAF, metadata repository, SBR, data collections)

• Core set implementation (against signposts based on periodicity)

2013 CS questionnaire was developed by a Task Force under the Steering Group

2009 ESCAP-wide assessment on

Capacity to Produce Basic Economic

Statistics

Early 2012-Diagnostic Tool developed by

ESCAP

Assessment subgroup formed

within the Steering Group to

shorten/streamline the tool and

conduct pilot tests

End-2012-CS questionnaire

finalized

2013 First Capacity Screening

conducted to obtain a baseline for RPES

(51 countries responded)

• Revisions are informed by the results of 2013 CS

• Comparability across time is maintained

Timeline:

– March 2017: CS questionnaire finalized

– April-May 2017: Second round of CS conducted

– End-2017: Results of the second round of CS available

2017 CS questionnaire is being designed by a Steering Group Task Force

• Consultative development of the tool

• Role of Steering Group and focal points in implementation

• Targeted dissemination of results (regional and subregional reports, national summary sheets)

• Use of results to inform national stakeholders, development of economic statistics projects by ESCAP and other partners, e.g. SBRs by ADB and peer-to-peer exchanges

• Knowing the limits of the exercise: a regional screening tool for capacity and not for in-depth assessment of quality

Success criteria for Capacity Screening

Capacity Screening can support monitoring of SDG targets on national statistical capacity

• Statistics development is a central part of means of implementation (Targets 17.18 and 17.19)

• Institutional, IT & Human Resources and Statistical Infrastructure of CS relate to all domains of statistics

Any questions?

More information about the Regional Programme and activities: http://communities.unescap.org/economic-statistics/ More information on ESCAP Statistics: http://www.unescap.org/our-work/statistics