ESCAP Statistics:
Implications for Agenda 2030
[a.k.a SDGs]
CCSA Twenty-sixth Session
1 October 2015
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Overview of the presentation
1. Context: Diversity
2. Regional Commission: Meeting of minds to
identify and address common concerns
3. Partnerships: Mechanisms for coordination
and facilitation of delivery of services
4. ESCAP Statistics: Regional hub for statistics
capacity development
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Diversity
• From 1.4 billion people in China to 11,000 in
Tuvalu
• Highly developed countries, Least Developed
countries, Small Island Developing States and
Landlocked Developing Countries
• Statistical systems range from highly centralized
to decentralized-- thousands of staff to just a
handful
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Diversity: Pacific Case
• Struggling to self-finance the HIES or DHS, and some rely
on external financial support for conducting their
census
• Lack experienced sampling statisticians, data analysts,
economic statisticians, communications and
advocacy specialists and IT-for-statistics experts
• Some countries do not and possibly will never, have the
national resources to compile basic statistics, including
many of the indicators required for international
development reporting
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Diversity: Economic Statistics [51]
24 countries do not have a Quality Assessment Framework for
economic statistics outputs
17 countries feel they have adequate HR to produce and
disseminate the Core Set of Economic Statistics
24 countries carry out an economic census
21 countries produce quarterly GDP(e)
11 countries produce monthly commodity price index
17 countries produce annual productivity measures
31 countries produce annual integrated national accounts
8 countries are able to produce annual indicators related to
natural resources
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Diversity: CRVS
Some of the most highly developed but also some of the
most dysfunctional systems in the world:
• Reported birth registration rates: from 24 per cent
(Nepal) to almost 100 per cent (New Zealand, Japan,
Rep. of Korea, Australia)
• 2/3 of children do not possess birth certificates
• Only 9 per cent of deaths registered in Tuvalu and
Nepal
• Rapid assessments scores range from 11 to 96 per cent
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Diversity: Mongolia
Mongolia Global Assessment: AGA Report (2014) findings spanning
legal, organizational, stakeholder relations, statistical infrastructure,
data production and dissemination processes, and domainspecific issues
• Coordination tool for development partners providing
support to the national statistical system
• A new NSDS (2016-2020) is drafted based on the findings of
AGA
• Revisions to Statistical Law to delineate more clearly the
scope of the NSS and official statistics and to ensure alignment
with the FPOS and incorporate the standards for quality
management for official statistics
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Diversity: Maldives
• National Bureau of Statistics of the Maldives operates
under the Ministry of Finance and Treasury in the
absence of a statistics law
• 30 staff members
• Mid-term review NSDS (2009-2019): Chief Statistician
requested a "forward looking assessment" with focus
on SDG monitoring, employment and environment
• Based on the assessment, a revised NSDS and a
programme of work in alignment with the strategy will
be devised
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Diversity: ‘Readiness’ for SDGs
• No country has data available for all
suggested indicators
• Preliminary estimates suggest huge gaps
• In the Pacific, countries are still lacking the
capacity to
Country
Availability
produce some
Pakistan
35 per cent of targets
25 per cent of indicators
Tier 1 indicators China
Mongolia
26 per cent of indicators
Rep. Korea
50 per cent of indicators
Japan
60 per cent of indicators
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Role of the Commission
Platform for reaching consensus on issues of
global relevance
• Regional initiatives directed by countries through
steering groups and advisory bodies
• Links global standards and mandates to country
activities
• Continuous contact between countries and ESCAP
• Establishes political commitment
• Align regional partners and coordinate activities
• Serve as a knowledge producing and sharing hub on
specific issues such as CRVS
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Role of the Commission
Platform for reaching consensus on issues of
global relevance
• Regional initiatives on
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–
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–
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Economic Statistics
Agriculture and Rural Statistics (Global Strategy)
Gender Statistics
Population and Social Statistics
CRVS –Get Every One in the Picture
• Supporting the three pillars of sustainable
development
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supporting member States to
strengthen their institutional
and technical capacity to
produce basic statistics
supporting capacity
development evidencebased discussions in
intergovernmental platforms
Analytical work
Capacity building
•
•
•
•
Regional Programmes
SIAP
Training Network
GPSDD
•
•
Regional Core Sets
Global Working Groups
and City Groups
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•
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Economic & Social Survey
Regional MDG Report
Stats Briefs
Working papers
pillars of
ESCAP Statistics
•
•
Asia-Pacific Statistical
Database
Statistical Yearbook
Normative work
Database
Supporting production of
basic statistics
supporting capacity
building, analytical
research, and regional
policy making
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Domain-specific initiatives
Governance
Crosscutting
initiatives
•
Regional
Programme on
Economic
Statistics
•
Regional
Strategy for
Population and
Social Statistics
•
Regional
Strategy for
Agricultural
and Rural
Statistics
•
Regional
Strategy for
CRVS
•
Modernization of statistical
production and services
• Steering Group for the Regional Programme on
Economic Statistics
• Regional Steering Group for Agricultural Statistics
• Regional Steering Group for Civil Registration and
Vital Statistics in Asia and the Pacific
• Technical Advisory Group on Population and
Social Statistics
•
•
•
Modular and
integration-focused
approach for
environment
statistics
•
Disaster-related
statistics
Gender statistics
Network for training
• Strategic Advisory Body for Modernization
of statistical production and services in
Asia and the Pacific (SAB-AP)
• Network for the Coordination of Statistical
Training in Asia and the Pacific
• Partners for Statistics Development in Asia
and the Pacific
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ESCAP Statistics
Data hub for the region
• The Statistical Database covers the region
and contains over 600 data series on a wide
range of topics on population, education,
health, poverty and inequalities, gender,
economy, environment and connectivity
• The Statistical database is used by ESCAP
divisions for their analytical work
• The Statistical Yearbook is produced in
collaboration with other divisions in ESCAP
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ESCAP Statistics
Exchanging experiences with implementing
global standards
•
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SNA 2008
SEEA
Civil Registration and Vital Statistics
Statistical Business Registers
Big Data
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The “WHY”
Mission Result: Enhanced capability of NSSs to
provide timely and quality official statistics in support
of evidence-based decision making for (sustainable
and inclusive) development
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Monitoring and reviewing of the SDGs
ESCAP is placed at the center for
monitoring and review of the SDGs
• Established forums: Asia-Pacific Forum for
Sustainable Development (APFSD)
• Regional data user-producer forum important
to raise awareness of statistical issues (e.g. in
policy community) and policy priorities
(among producers)
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Monitoring and reviewing of the SDGs
Committee on Statistics
• Biannual meeting place for Statisticians
• High level of interaction with member
countries during and between sessions
• Will support integration of SDGs monitoring &
statistics/data in national development plans
• Have guided regional/subregional
consultations on statistics & data in support of
global & regional monitoring (IAEG & HLG)
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Bureau of the Committee
The Committee elected the following officers:
• Chair:
Ms. Aishath Shahuda (Maldives)
• Vice-Chairs:
Mr. Suryamin
(Indonesia)
Mr. Hyungsoo Park
(Republic of Korea)
Mr. Alexander Surinov (Russian Federation)
• Member:
• Rapporteur:
Mr. Simil Johnson
Ms. Teresa Dickinson
(Vanuatu)
(New Zealand)
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Monitoring and reviewing of the SDGs
Dialogue and partnerships
• Partners for Statistics Development in Asia and
the Pacific
• CRVS Partnership (15 partner organizations)
• Regional Training Network established
• Involved in global partnerships and collaboration
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SDMX
CRVS Global Group
GWG on Use of Big Data for Official Statistics
Anchor partner: Global Partnership for Sustainable
Development Data
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Monitoring and reviewing of the SDGs
• Our unique ability to contact any part of a
national government gives us the ability to
reach broader
– CRVS Regional Steering Group and Ministerial
Conference is an example where 4 government
sectors are represented
• Countries are directing our work and decides
on priorities
– Countries are calling for regional monitoring and
review of the SDGs
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Onward to better preparedness
• Countries take the lead
– ESCAP Statistics at the fore-front of SDG implementation: the
go-to-place for countries and ensuring country ownership
and leadership in SDG implementation.
• Partnerships, collaboration and coordination
– On initiatives on SDG-implementation will be key to ESCAP’s
work over the coming years
– On capacity building SDG related data issues
• Doing it
– Inter-governmental platform : Committee on Statistics,
APFSD, Commission sessions
– SIAP as capacity development hub for ESCAP Statistics
– How else? [CCSA]
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THANK YOU
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