The role of the standards in the modernisation of official

statistics

Aija Žīgure, President

Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia

Standardisation – an important aspect of the European Statistical System (ESS)

Statistical output standards in many areas

Interoperability

Generic approach

Widely used

Pre-conditions-policy context

Changing environment – personnel, resources, data

sources

Increased industrialisation of statistics

Integrated production system

Changing work environment

Administrative issues

Resources (human, finance)

What needs to be done

Interoperability

Interface specifications

Clear definitions and vocabulary for standardisation concepts

Inventory of standards

Life cycle management – continuity and timeliness structured approach

The architectural framework

Impact assessment

Environment and communication

SDMX – standardised environment for data exchange (1)

SDMX - a good example of:

– Technical standard

– Overall approach

Good integration possibilities

In accordance with the latest ideas, improvements

Harmonised way of data exchange with both European and international organisations

SDMX – standardised environment for data exchange (2)

Pre-conditions for better use:

If a simple and clear user interface for humans be used

Environment is widely used (in all statistical domains)

Not widely used at CSB of Latvia

Experience of CSB of Latvia (1)

Centralized metadata driven statistical data management system development and usage in production – since 2002:

• Standardized data collection, entry, validation and aggregation environment for business and social statistics domains;

• Metadata driven which gives flexibility for introducing any survey in the system.

Quality standards in use – since 2011

• Moving towards ISO standard

Standardization is an ongoing process

Good governance practice

Improving the effectiveness of the organisation e-document storage and circulation system

Accounting of working time and financial resources at various levels

Product, process, division/department, position, expert

Flexible tools for analysis of product costs

IT an important (crucial?) component in reaching the goal

Experience of CSB of Latvia (2)

Standardization approach Enabler = information technology

Historically existing

environment

Analysis, typical

processes identification

Common information

system development

Result:common environment, standardized

approach

Movement towards more process oriented and standardized organization, the CSB approach: • existing situation analysis; • existing processes analysis, common processes identification

among different subject matter units; • information system architecture, which is based on common

processes, establishment; • processes and standards documentation.

Experience of CSB of Latvia (3)

Systemic approach - Process oriented changes

Processes organization, historical

Processes organization, nowadays

Experience of CSB of Latvia (4)

Future movement with standardization via information systems

• standardized data collection environment – done

• standardized data analysis environment via OLAP technologies and data cubes generation – work in progress

• standardized macroeconomic data analysis and production – bright future

Experience of CSB of Latvia (5)

Standard as a mean to implement solution or solution as a driving force for standardization?