COORDINATION OF NATIONAL STATISTICAL SYSTEMS AND
REPORTING MECHANISMS FOR MDG DATA TO INTERNATIONAL
AGENCIES
BOTSWANA EXPERIENCE
May 2008
A N Majelantle
Government Statistician
Central Statistics office
Ministry of Finance and Development planning
Botswana
Workshop on MDG Monitoring, Kampala - Uganda 5-8 May 2008
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COORDINATION OF NATIONAL STATISTICAL SYSTEMS AND
REPORTING MECHANISMS FOR MDG DATA TO INTERNATIONAL
AGENCIES
1.
Introduction
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) is a Government Department within the Ministry of
Finance and Development Planning. It is the apex body in the official statistical system of
the country; hence most official statistical operations fall within the mandate of this
office. The CSO operates within the legal framework of the Statistics Act (Cap 17:01) of
the Laws of Botswana, which has broad but explicit terms, outlines the duties of the
Department. The Statistics Act was promulgated in 1967 while the Census Act (Cap
17:02) dates back to 1904. It was through these Acts that CSO was established, for the
primary purpose of collecting statistics (including censuses and sample surveys), as a unit
within the Statistics and Planning Section of the Ministry of Finance and Development
Planning. In 1968, CSO became an independent Department
Legislation And CSO’s Mandate
2.
The Statistics Act put CSO as the principal data collecting, processing and disseminating
agency responsible for coordinating, monitoring and supervising the National Statistical
System. It thus has the statutory mandate to produce and provide government, the private
sector, parastatal organisations, international organisations, the civil society and the
general public with statistical information for decision-making, policy formulation and
planning purposes. The statutory mandate also includes the responsibility of providing
advisory and technical service to all users on statistical matters.
The Legislation therefore designate CSO as a central coordinating agency to enable it to
have professional control in statistical matters over all statistical units in other statistical
agencies.
3.
Specific Aims And Objectives
More specifically, the aims of the Central Statistics Office may be outlined as follows:
i.
ii.
iii.
iv.
To act as the nodal agency for planned development of the statistical system in the
country.
To lay down and maintain the norms and standards in the field of statistics,
involving concepts and definitions, methodology of data collection, processing of
data and dissemination of results.
To provide an advisory service to Government and other users on all-statistical
matters and related subjects.
To provide regular and timely statistical information on the economic and social
state of the country and its people.
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v.
vi.
vii.
viii.
ix.
x.
xi.
xii.
To provide statistical information on the socio-economic status of households and
families in Botswana.
To provide information on the population characteristics from time to time.
To conduct the large scale national sample surveys for creating data base needed
for studying the impact of specific problems for the benefit of different population
groups in diverse socio-economic areas.
To mobilise need resources for production and provision of quality and timely
statistical services.
Dissemination of statistical information on various aspects through a number of
regular or ad-hoc publications to Government, parastatals, SADC member
countries and various other national and international organisations; and through
seminars/workshops.
To plan, monitor and coordinate statistical activities for standardization and
harmonization of codes and indicators..
To ensure that the work programme for the office reflects the needs of users and to
encourage frequent communication with users in order to assess these needs.
To expand the scope for statistical services as and when resources permit.
4. The Functional Structure
The Central Statistical Office discharges its mandate through divisions, devided into 20
Units from Economic Statistics, Social Statistics, Census and surveys and Service Units.
Economic Statistics
Social Statistics
Statistical Units
Statistical Units
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Environment
Industrial
National Accounts
Prices & Poverty
Trade
Transport
Agriculture
Communication
9. Demograph
y
10. Education
11. Health
12. Labour
Censuses and
Surveys
Statistical Units
13. Census
14. Cartography
15. Household
Surveys
Service Units
16. Administration
Training
and
Library
17. Computing Services
18. Regional
StationFrancistown
19. Monitoring
and
Evaluation: Vision
2016 & MDGs
Remark: CSO is a semi-centralised department. While a great number of the units within
CSO are housed with the Department headquarters, some units have been seconded to
their line ministries. These are Agriculture, Transport, Education, Trade and Health.
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5.
Statistical Coordination
There has been some organizational changes and transformations over the years due to
continuing statistical developments, increasing demands in statistical information for
evidence based –decision making, policy formulations and monitoring and evaluation of
country goals like V2016 and MDGs. The Department started with about 6 units at its
onset to 20 units to-date with more expansion envisaged to cover other areas which needs
statistical information for their monitoring and evaluation purposes.
CSO’s Mission
To improve decision-making and the formulation of policies
and programs, by providing an efficient, reliable and timely
statistical service to Government, the private sector and the
public at large.
Following the recommendations of the User-Needs Assessment Workshop in 1995, the
CSO has User-Producer Committees, which are meant to maintain a continuous dialogue
between CSO and the major users of the data, including the private sector.
Whenever the CSO has to carry out exercises of multidisciplinary nature such as a
population and housing census, an income and expenditure survey, a literacy survey, etc.,
CSO forms Reference Group (RG) and Technical Working Group (TWG) committees on
policy related and technical matters respectively. Reference Group Committee, which is
concerned with policy matters, is normally composed of Senior Officials of affected
Organisations. TWG Committees are constituted with subject-matter experts from both
Government agencies and non-governmental organisations. The extent to which these
committees have been successful is varied. The CSO is also a member of similar
committees belonging to different Organisations.
Coordination entails establishing meaningful and effective linkages among various
entities and units within the national statistical service and contributions to the bigger
picture by all concerned. Depending on the organizational structure (centralized or
decentralized), communication also means that the organizational units and managers
play an active role in contributing to various processes, such as those of priority setting,
effective utilization of common resources, harmonization and integration of statistics and
use of common standards.
The process of effective coordination of various statistical activities becomes more
intensified as more agencies address issues of identifying their mission, defining goals
and specifying attainable objectives.
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Objectives of coordination are: To ensure a maximum of integration in the statistical process and its
outputs.
 To realize the full potential of personnel and other resources in providing
quality services
 To promote the use of appropriate and effective methods in the collection
and production of statistics.
 To apply common standards and best methodology.
 To identify and define statistical priorities and requirements.
 To meet the demand for statistical effectively and efficiency.
 To ensure maximum cooperation of data providers.
 To take full account of the load enquiries place on providers of data.
 To improve awareness of the importance of statistics.
 To make data available according to the important themes and priorities of
the government and the community.
 To identify gaps in national statistics and
 To promote statistical development.
6.
Linkage within Organization and Planners
The quality of internal communication is an important factor influencing the efficiency
and effectiveness of activities and functions, including coordination within a statistics
office. Horizontal dimension of committee structures ensures communication and
exchange of information between different divisions, departments and units. There are
permanent monthly and quarterly committees, ad hoc committees and task forces etc.
Linkage with planners is through bi-weekly meetings of statisticians and planners to
appraise one another with project implementation processes and statistical activities.
This has improved the use of statistics in project planning in government. Other
instruments of coordination include attendance of seminars, workshops and conferences.
7.
Linkage With International Organisations
Linkage with international organizations development partners include collaboration in
statistical advocacy and statistical development. Development partners provide technical
assistant through training workshops, short term consultancy working with local
statistical officers or supporting NSO staff to attend regional of sub-regional training
workshops.
8.
Preparation of The MDG Country Report.
The MDG monitoring coordination is the responsibility of the Population Development
Coordination Unit in the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning. This Unit is
responsible for coordinating the preparation of the MDG report with assistance from the
responsible UN Agency. Other stakeholders including CSO participate during this
process. The CSO’s mandate in this process is to ensure that the latest, accurate and
reliable information is used in the report. Even though the data will be available on CSO
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website, reports or received during dissemination workshops, CSO as the nations’s data
repository, update the MDG indictors with latest data from census, surveys and
administrative data reports from different sectors as shown on item 4 above. For this
reason, CSO is the focal point for MDG data provision. There is no duplication of data
provision since the Botswana system of data provision is centralized and is coordinated
by CSO.
9.
Calendar of MDG data and metadata
The MDG data in CSO is kept at indicator format. It does not include the metadata of
indicators even though they are available elsewhere. There is also no calendar of specific
MDG data release since the data is view as just one of the many data produced by the
Department. The department has a schedule of intercensal surveys and annual plan of
publication of different annual reports for each financial year. These will include MDG
indictors as covered by different sectors and Units. The lack of metadata is due to the
fact that there has not been any request for the information. The lack of capacity on the
matter result in concentration on the frequently requested information.
10.
Mechanisms of Reporting MDG Data to International Agencies.
CSO regularly receive questionnaires on different data sets from international
organizations such as UN (NY) to complete and send back. Other requests are sent
through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or other Ministries and passed on to CSO for
provision of information. The Office is not aware of when it is actually expected to
submit MDG data. The data is only submitted when required and available. The CSO is
not aware of any specific office responsible for receiving MDG data and its timelines.
11.
MDG Data Reporting Problems
Discrepancies of data exist between the national and international agency’s data in global
reports. The methodologies for such discrepancies are not known since the NSO sends
accurate data thorough the received questionnaires. This problem is common with the
global Human Development Report especially on mortality data. The Botswana data has
never been correct in this report. Methodologies for estimation of HDR data need to be
communicated to CSO. A workshop on sharing these methodologies will be highly
appreciated. Communication with the HDI Global Office needs to be introduced so that
bilateral collaboration with concerned countries could be realised.
12.
Conclusion
Coordination with stakeholders at national level is satisfactory. Collaboration with
development partners of statistical advocacy, capacity building and statistical
development is satisfactory. Collaboration with International organization regarding
global report data provision is weak and results in data discrepancies.
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13.
Recommendation
Collaboration with international organizations must include mechanisms of reporting and
submitting data to sub-regional and international organization using one type of
questionnaire, through one agreed office and at agreed timelines known by all concerned.
Agree on a strategy for short term attachment of NSO representatives at the global offices
for hands on capacity building on global report preparation. Global office to conduct a
workshop on report preparation format/ methodology at sub-regional level.
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