‫جمــهوری اســـــــــــالمی افغانســــــــــتان‬
‫اداره مرکزی احصائیه‬
Islamic Republic of Afghanistan
Central Statistics Organization
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
First draft January 2010
Minor revisions August 2010
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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Table of contents
Part I – Approach
5
1 Introduction
5
2 Routine surveys in the ANSP
2.1 Annual National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment
2.2 Modules to the NRVA
2.3 Other household surveys
2.4 The potential for model-based estimation
2.5 Options for transition of ownership of household surveys to CSO
2.6 Establishment surveys and business registers
2.7 Indicators of job growth or job creation
2.8 Survey of Agriculture
2.9 Consumer Price Index
2.10 Analytical Studies and National Accounts
2.11 Data Quality Assurance
2.12 Data analysis
9
9
11
12
13
13
15
17
17
17
18
19
20
3 Census of Population and Housing
23
4 Institutional Development and Capacity Building
4.1 Organizational Development
4.2 Provincial Statistical Offices
4.3 ‘Learning by doing’
4.4 Training
4.5 Statistical Infrastructure
4.6 Dissemination
27
27
28
28
29
33
34
5 Administrative Data
35
6 Information & Communication Technology
37
7 Physical infrastructure
39
8 Project cost and administration
41
Part II – Five-Year Action Plan under the Afghanistan National Statistical
Plan
Error! Bookmark not defined.
Annex A – Analysis of NRVA and MICS questionnaires
42
Annex B – Comments on CSO Capacity Building Plan: Items for Omission or
Re-specification
45
Annex C - The demand for data
C.1 Main findings
49
49
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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C.2 The unemployment rate
50
Annex D – Motivational Issues and the Historical Context
53
Annex E – Revised and annotated capacity building plan matrix for 2010-16
55
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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Abbreviations
ACBR
ADB
AISA
ANDS
ANSP
CBP
CPH
CPI
CSO
CWIQ
DECA
DfID
EC
GDP
GIS
HIES
IBES
IMF
MDG
MICS
MIS
MRRDNAD
NRVA
OTJ
PRR
PSO
SCB
SMP
SNA
SUSENAS
TA
TOR
UNFPA
WFP
Afghanistan Central Business Registry
Asian Development Bank
Afghan Investment Support Agency
Afghanistan National Development Strategy
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
Capacity Building Plan
Census of Population and Housing
Consumer Price Index
Central Statistical Organisation
Core Welfare Indicators Questionnaire (Pakistan)
Delegation of the European Commission to Afghanistan
Department for International Development (UK)
European Community
Gross domestic product
Geographic Information System
Household Income and Expenditure Survey
Integrated Business Establishment Survey
International Monetary Fund
Millennium Development Goal
Multi-Indicator Cluster Survey
Management Information System
Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development
National Accounts Department
National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment
On the job
Priority Restructuring and Reform
Provincial Statistical Office
Statistical Capacity Building
Statistical Master Plan
System of National Accounts
National Socio-Economic Survey (Indonesia)?
Technical Assistance
Terms of Reference
United Nations Population Fund
World Food Program
(The above is an incomplete list, to be completed in the next version)
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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Part I – Approach
1 Introduction
The Central Statistics Organization (CSO), Afghanistan, which was established in 1973,
wants to develop its capacity substantially and seeks donor support to do so. In pursuit
of this, CSO has prepared the first Afghanistan National Statistical Plan (ANSP), in
consultation with government agencies and key statistics donors.
The permanent staff of CSO expanded in anticipation of a Census of Population and
Housing, and is currently numbering about 587 (including 142 staff in provincial
offices), of whom 60 are university graduates and another 9 have master’s degrees.1 Some
staff in leading positions have had long careers at CSO dating back to the Seventies and
Eighties. Nevertheless, most of the staff are relatively new and CSO has remarkably little
recent experience collecting field data since 1981.2 CSO did conduct a nationwide
population census in 1979 and a sample household survey of income and expenditures in
Kabul in 1981. Since then its only major experience has been to conduct two pre-census
household listings, one in 2003-05, and another in 2009, with the first of these followed
by data collection at 1 in 200 households. These field activities were supported by
Geographic Information System (GIS) in the form of preparing maps, as well as data
entry. In addition, the IT section at CSO was also involved in data entry for the National
Risk and Vulnerability Survey (NRVA) in 2007-08, although NRVA field activities were
confided to an external group. Furthermore, in May 2009, CSO conducted a sample
survey of establishments, the first sample survey since 1981. Beside collecting monthly
price data for the Consumer Price Index, the main function of CSO has simply been to
collect administrative data from various government agencies, as well as compulsory
reports from various establishments, mostly governmental ones.
Previous efforts to develop statistical capacity on a wide front at CSO since 2001 have
largely failed for various reasons, including attempts to do too much too quick and
inattention to motivational issues, which will be discussed later.
At present it is especially critical for CSO to develop its statistical capacity for several
reasons, including:
1
2
There are also contract employees, who number 86 in the provinces and 127 at headquarters.
The data show that staff with 10 or more years of experience constituted 46 percent of total staff at headquarters in Kabul in
2009, but only 34 percent in 2006, indicating that a substantial CSO expansion took place during the years 1996-99.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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


Expectations from the Afghanistan National Development Strategy (ANDS) 3 that
requires a wide spectrum of data for monitoring progress towards its goals;
Imminence of a national population census, which has led the UN Population Fund
(UNFPA) to assess the capacity of CSO to conduct and analyze a census;
The decisions by donors to confide various national household surveys, hitherto taken
by ad hoc, external agencies, to CSO, either all at once or in stages. These include the
NRVA and the Multi- Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS). CSO has not conducted a
national household survey, yet.
In such a situation demand for data is both real and immenent. Facing these very real
demands, CSO has to break down the vicious circle of non-performance. It is therefore
believed that one of the main challenges facing CSO is learning by doing, with training
playing an important but subsidiary role.
Just like other statistical offices in developing countries, CSO has embarked on the
preparation of its ANSP with the goal of coordinating development initiatives and donor
activities.
Structure of the Afghanistan National Statistics Plan
Part I narrates the overall strategy, starting from what needs to be delivered to how to
build statistical capacity to undertake the required activities and build a sustainable
institution.
Part II provides for an Action Plan for 2010-2015, with in the form of activity details,
and annual costs for each item.
The Action Plan was derived from a list of activities presented in Annex E, which was
updated and strengthened, in view of the approach described under part I, an earlier plan
that CSO prepared during 2008-09 called the “Capacity Building Plan” (CBP) or the “7year plan”. The CBP was a rather costly wish list that was based largely on inputs from
data users without adequate consideration for an overall approach and coherence. Recommendations of a previous Statistical Master Plan, presented in 2004, were also reviewed,
but the CBP, being more recent, was considered more suitable as a starting point for the
ANSP.
Given the proposed overall strategy, the sequence of Part I will differ somewhat from the
sequence of the itemized ANSP matrix (Part II) and the Action Plan (Part III) themselves,
as follows: First we will narrate the data collection activities to be conducted in the field
and the analyses to be conducted at CSO, and only then will we take up institutional
development and capacity building, including training. In contrast, the ANSP and the
Action Plan follow a sequence that CSO used for its own “Capacity Building Plan”, under
which institutional development and capacity building were treated first.
Annexes deal with several issues that are separate from the plan itself. This will help
keep Part I concise.
3
The ANDS was formulated in April 2008, and serves as the country’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP).
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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



Annex A present an analysis of the NRVA questionnaire and some future options;
Annex B reviews the previous CBP and explain why some tasks were either removed
from the plan or restructured. Upon consideration, it was concluded that the CBP
represented an attempt to do too much too soon;
Annex C presents a brief review of user needs. It turns out, however, that user needs
do not affect the chosen set of tasks as much as one might expect. Given the scarcity
of reliable statistics and the low level of capacity at CSO, the challenge at this time is
not so much to meet all of the needs or even to prioritize the needs as it is to identify
among all the key needs a subset that is feasible to satisfy in the near future and is
sustainable;
Annex D reviews a complex of motivational issues that have guided the preparation
of this ANSP and action plan;
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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2 Routine surveys in the ANSP
Routine household surveys will constitute the main “learning by doing” activity at CSO
under the ANSP. Eventually they should involve the Provincial Statistical Offices (PSOs)
as well as headquarter’s staff. These surveys are itemized in section B.1 of both the
ANSP and the action plan. The survey program proposed here was designed to meet
important user needs while also facilitating statistical capacity building (SCB) at CSO
with a series of tasks that will provide good learning opportunities without overburdening
its nascent capacity.
2.1
Annual National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment
An annual National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment (NRVA) is proposed as the core
household survey to be carried out by CSO. Besides providing valuable data, this survey
will also serve as a continuing training ground for CSO staff, enabling the organization
to raise gradually its capacity to conduct household surveys and giving assurance of
continued activity to the involved staff. This will be much more useful for statistical capacity building (SCB) than intermittent household surveys. Following are some broad
guidelines for this annual survey:




The next NRVA, scheduled for 2010, provides an opportunity for a transition toward
the model recommended here;
A questionnaire for an annual “core” NRVA would need to be relatively short, meaning much shorter than the questionnaire for NRVA 3, taken in 2007-08. Some choices
for the questionnaire are discussed below and in Annex A;
Given the shortness of the “core” questionnaire, modules can be added to the NRVA
from time to time to investigate special topics, as will be discussed in the next subsection. In order to focus on SCB at CSO, however, it is proposed to add no module until
2012, so that only the core questionnaire is implemented during 2010-11.
A sample of 21,000 households, as in NRVA 3, would continue to provide data for 45
domains, giving robust data for all 34 provinces and the Kuchi stratum, as well as
many large cities.
As to the topics to be covered in the core questionnaire, two models based on two different developing countries deserve consideration:

One approach, based on the example of the core questionnaire for the annual Susenas
survey in Indonesia, involves asking summary questions about expenditure. By themselves, these questions do not provide a reliable basis for estimating poverty rates –
only a full expenditure module can do that. But Indonesian analysts who have in hand
both the core questionnaire (sample of nearly 300,000) and the expenditure module
(sample of only 68,000) can model the relationships between the two kinds of
expenditure data and use this model to develop poverty estimates at the district level
from the core questionnaire for the census year.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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
Another approach involves exclusion of expenditure questionnaire altogether from
the core questionnaire because it would take up too many questions in. In this approach the core questionnaire would, instead, follow the example of the CWIQ
survey in Pakistan.
To sum up, in both the Susenas and the CWIQ cases, the full expenditure data needed
for assigning poverty status is not available from the core questionnaire but from a
different questionnaire – the expenditure module for Susenas, and the biannual full
questionnaire for CWIQ. Nevertheless, it may be possible with time to develop a model –
similar to the one in Indonesia – for estimating annual poverty rates by province from a
core questionnaire that collects data that is well correlated with poverty status, but this
possibility can only be assessed with empirical research. The potential and risks of
model-based estimates is discussed in section 2.4 below.
In budgeting for a future NRVA, it is useful to consider historical costs.


The 3rd NRVA. Operational costs for the most recent NRVA were $1.8 million. The
survey involved a field staff of 150 who conducted the survey over a 12-month
period. This amount does not include the costs of national project staff, or that of
international consultants, who spent a total of about 40 person-months to design and
manage the survey and to analyze the results and train Afghans to tabulate the data.
The 2nd NRVA. Operational costs then were only $600,000, as this involved taking
the survey in a single burst of activity over two months or so, with a field staff of
about 600.
The comparison shows that it is much more costly to take the survey over a 12 month
period than in a single burst, due to sharp increases in the cost of labour and vehicle rental, which are used more efficiently in a single burst. On the other hand, the data collected
throughout the year adjusts for seasonal variations in expenditure and therefore provides a
more meaningful picture of average conditions.
For the annual NRVA, a compromise is proposed between the 12-month and single-burst
approaches. This would involve taking the survey in four quarterly bursts. Estimated
operational costs would run to about $1.3 million, plus roughly another $100,000 for
project staff. This approach would adjust for most seasonal variation, but at substantially
less cost than the 12-month approach. Moreover, this approach would allow for the use of
a relatively small field staff (150 or a bit more), facilitating the transition to CSO
ownership in three ways:



Data entry would be spread throughout the year, enabling staff to do trial tabulations
for each quarter and use these as a guide for data cleaning;
The total staff required would be much smaller in number than for the single-burst
approach, putting the goal of majority CSO participation in the field work much more
within reach;
The frequent bursts of field work would keep CSO staff involved far more often in a
“learning by doing” process than if field work were confined to a single burst and
would motivate staff to make a real commitment to the work.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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If one compares the quarterly-burst approach with the monthly one, the following
considerations argue in favour of the quarterly approach:


The quarterly approach would be considerably less costly and easier to supervise than
the monthly one. For a long-term survey program at CSO, these are major considerations. The savings would be for both operational costs (especially vehicles) and the
cost of international consultants who will play a supervisory role.
The findings are unlikely to differ sharply from those of the monthly approach, inasmuch as the quarterly approach will automatically adjust for a larger share of seasonality. Moreover, the agreement or lack of it thereof between the findings of a
quarterly and monthly survey can be assessed by comparing the findings for the
whole country based on two ways of tabulating the data for NRVA3: (a) data for the
sample that was administered during the four months that would be chosen for a
quarterly approach and (b) data for the full 12-month period sample.
A four-quarter survey would confront access problem in winter just as did the 12-month
approach. It appears that 40 districts are usually inaccessible in winter, while another 8090 districts are intermittently blocked. Workarounds for this problem involve waiting for
the right moment to enter the designated village and either interviewing retrospectively or
imputing the data for blocked areas based on the data for the same areas in spring and fall
together with data for the covered areas in all seasons.
The mode of transition from project management approach to a program approach
involving CSO management – with regard to NRVA and all other household surveys -is discussed in section 2.5 below.
2.2
Modules to the NRVA
Some countries have a brief “core” annual questionnaire for the household survey, to
which they attach more specialized modules from time to time.


In Indonesia, a large country, the core Susenas (National Socio-Economic Survey)
questionnaire is taken at about 390,000 households (was 270,000 until recently) so as
to provide data that is valid at the district level, while the modules are taken every
year (but with varying topics) at only 68,000 households to provide data that is valid
at the provincial level.
In Pakistan, another large country, a short questionnaire called CWIQ (Core Welfare
Indicators Questionnaire) is conducted every other year involving a sample of 80,000
households, while a longer questionnaire is administered in the alternate years
involving 15,000 households.
For Afghanistan, a wide variety of topics could be considered for modules; the list of
sections from NRVA 3 provides a starting point for selecting such topics.


Expenditure will be a prime topic for a module.
A labour force survey would be another prime topic. The questionnaire would need to
be more extensive than the one used for NRVA 3. As far as possible, it is
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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
recommended to adhere to the standard questionnaire recommended by the
International Labour Organization (ILO), even if this involves separate pages for each
family member, rather than providing only a separate row in a table for each family
member. The latter method occasionally involves small simplifications that limit the
international comparability of the data. A labour force module would need to be
designed to accommodate various alternative concepts of unemployment, given the
widespread discontent in Afghanistan with the standard ILO concept.
Child labour would also be a prime topic, about which the ILO has expressed interest.
It may be possible to combine this topic with a labour force module.
2.3
Other household surveys
Although, an effort has been made to minimize the number of separate household
surveys, so as to focus on a routine annual surveys, it has not been possible to eliminate
two separate surveys.
First is a Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES), which involves a very detailed questionnaire and cannot be combined with NRVA. The later involves using
expenditure diaries and repeated revisits to ensure that household members are
consistently filling out the diaries. In addition, the sampling approach is also different, as
HIES focuses mainly on urban households, for the simple, practical reason that the CPI in
Afghanistan and many other countries is for cities. Due to the challenging nature of the
survey technique for CSO, which has not conducted such a survey for the last 20 years, it
will be best to begin first with a Kabul HIES, with HIES for other cities to follow in a
year or two. The last HIES was carried out in 1981, and the consumption baskets based
on that HIES are now very much out of date. A Kabul HIES would be very useful for
updating CPI weights at least for Kabul, which may account for a good half of the
weights in the current CPI. A sample size of 800 to 1000 households per city would be
adequate enough, for each of the cities covered by the CPI. The CPI at present covers 10
cities; expansion in 2010 is foreseen to 14 cities.
Second to consider is the Multi Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS). MICS is based on a
standardized questionnaire that has been tested and implemented in many developing
countries under UNICEF sponsorship, and is very much designed in support of monitoring progress towards the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). As such, MICS tends
to give precedence to international comparability over national comparability and specific
country data needs. MICS was previously carried out in Afghanistan in 1997 and then in
2003 under the aegis of CSO, but with implementation in the hands of an external project,
again under UNICEF sponsorship.
NRVA is likely to evolve into a core questionnaire that will not include so many questions about the health of women and children. In future, it is recommended that no specialized health module be attached to the NRVA, and that MICS and NRVA and any other
health survey be harmonized so as to maximize comparability across surveys and, critically, over time. For NRVA3, such coordination may not have taken place, as is indicated
by the lack of any discussion in the health chapter (chapter 8) of the draft NRVA report
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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on comparability with the 2003 MICS data. Likewise the forthcoming MICS has not considered comparability with existing national instruments such as the NRVA.
The potential of linking MICS data with the kind of socio-economic data in NRVA does
deserve further consideration. Such linkage allows for multivariate analysis of the interactions between health issues and other variables such as expenditure per capita and educational attainment. NRVA3 itself can be analyzed for such linkages, and it is not obvious
that similar analyses will be frequently needed. On another occasion, linkage could be
attempted in a virtual way, by choosing a common set of Primary Sample Units and coordinating the travel of the MICS and NRVA teams to the same PSUs (perhaps even sharing a vehicle), where they could select samples involving different households to avoid
respondent fatigue. Such linkage should not be attempted, however, until CSO first develops a solid, practical capacity to undertake household surveys.
2.4
The potential for model-based estimation
The potential use of NRVA data for model-based estimates of poverty and other characteristics of interest needs to be further investigated when planning for future household
surveys. The potential uses are mentioned in two places in this document:

In the discussion of the Afghanistan Population and Housing Census (APHC),
with regard to the possibility of using the APHC data to prepare district-level
poverty estimates on the basis of provincial level NRVA data and APHC data at
the district level for characteristics that are well correlated with poverty rates in
the NRVA data.

In the discussion of the scheduling of an expenditure module for future NRVAs,
the possibility of using NRVA data for aggregate expenditures to model provincial level poverty estimates for years when a full expenditure module is not implemented.
The reliability of a model-based approach will, of course, depend on the degree of
correlation between the target measure (such as poverty rates) and the proxy indicators
that are available from the more succinct source (such as province, family structure,
housing characteristics, occupation, educational attainment, and labour force status of
head of household, etc). Where correlation is high, the model-based estimates would be
relatively reliable, otherwise less so. Further research will be needed to develop a clearer
picture of the relevant correlations.
2.5
Options for transition of ownership of household surveys to
CSO
A thorny issue is how to manage the transition from CSO’s current zero experience with
household surveys to full management. This is also the issue of how to manage “the transfer of the technology” of survey-taking to CSO.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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The case of NRVA will be discussed in some detail but the same issues will apply to any
other survey. For NRVA, an independent unit was the implementing agency – the National Surveillance System (NSS), a project that began in 2003 under the Ministry for
Rural Rehabilitation and Development (MRRD) but eventually came to include CSO as
well. To be sure, the NRVA team does not consist of permanent staff, but rather of temporary contract workers. For each NRVA iteration, a project team must be reconstituted
under the supervision of the international consulting firm, which has been ICON. The
NRVA enumerators were selected on the basis of a mental agility that would enable them
to master the contents of the full NRVA questionnaire, which for NRVA 3 ran to 38
pages for the men’s questionnaire and 37 for the women’s. CSO staff have never served
as NRVA enumerators, and it is unclear how many CSO staff would qualify if they applied for the job. On the grounds of educational attainment alone, CSO staff would have
difficulty competing, as a quick survey of the 142 NRVA enumerators and supervisors
showed that about 75 of them had an educational attainment of 14 or 16 years.4 (The percentage with 14 or more years of education was considerably higher for men than for
women, as is consistent with the much larger number of male than female graduates).
CSO, with only 69 university graduates and 29 diploma graduates (many of whom would
not be available for field work), would have major difficulty fielding an NRVA staff with
the educational levels of the NRVA team. For this reason, it can be said that CSO will
have to “climb a steep hill” in order to implement an NRVA-type survey with the same
level of performance that was achieved by the NSS project. Two possible models suggest
themselves:

One is that CSO officers manage a project, but with substantial involvement of national and international consultants in overseeing operations. This involvement could
gradually phase out from year to year as CSO managers become more experienced;

Another possible model for a transition to CSO would be for an external project such
as NSS to include CSO staff in its ranks in a stepwise way, aiming for a share of, for
example, 30 percent in the first year, with increasing shares in subsequent years. By
the time that CSO takes over full management, it would have taken steps to raise its
capacity and have gained a practical understanding of the need to use external staff to
fill gaps in its own ranks.
Similar transitional arrangements will be needed for the transfer of NRVA management.
An important part of the management task for NRVA involved negotiating access for
teams in conflict-stricken districts.
NRVA has been conducted using vehicles that carry six persons: a driver, a supervisor,
and two teams of interviewers – each including a man and a woman. Most provinces
require a single car with two teams, but some larger ones have two cars and some cars
cover two small provinces. CSO involvement would tend to reduce costs in two ways, as
compared with an external project. First, the project could rent vehicles from CSO, which
4
Based on a telephone survey of NRVA staff that was carried out in November 2009 at the request of the consultant. Phone
calls were placed to the supervisors of each provincial team, with data obtained for 95 out of 143 enumerators and field
supervisors.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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should be somewhat less costly than rental on the open market. Second, as CSO staff is
increasingly brought into the enumeration process, labour costs should fall somewhat as
compared with contract labour hired on the open market, because CSO staff would be less
concerned about employment during the gaps between bursts of survey activity, as compared with contract labour.
The preferred model for the transition to CSO ownership is still under discussion at CSO.
2.6
Establishment surveys and business registers
Establishment surveys are listed in section B2 of both the ANSP and the Action Plan. The
register of medium and large establishments, which now number about 1800, is updated
yearly with new listings from the Afghan Investment Support Agency (AISA). The cutoff for the register, measured in terms of employment, varies by sector from, for example,
50 for manufacturing to 30 for services. Until recently, the AISA data provided about 100
new listings each year. During 2008, however, Afghanistan developed a new system for
registering both limited liability and sole proprietorship companies that has been applied
in Kabul and some other provinces, under the Afghanistan Central Business Registry
(ACBR) at the Ministry of Commerce and Industry.5 It is not yet clear what impact the
ACBR system will have on the updating of the CSO register, but it is almost certain that
revised CSO updating procedures for the statistical register will be needed to take full
advantage of the new source.6 Fortunately, the ACBR data does include certain critical
variables for statistical purposes, such as: location address, telephone number, number of
workers and description of main product.
The paucity of establishment statistics is generally recognized as a major weakness of the
Afghan statistical system, severely inhibiting the development of national accounts. CSO
continues to rely on obligatory reporting by listed establishments, a relic of its socialist
phase, but this system is becoming unwieldy due to the increasing number of
establishments. For business registries, two broad coverage risks normally arise in every
country:
a. Does the register include all the establishments (or enterprises) that are supposed
to be included – for example, the ones above a specified cut-off? This issue normally leads in turn to the question whether the updating procedure succeeds in
capturing the new establishments above the cut-off as they form. This question in
turn can obviously be broken into two parts: (a) Does it capture the new establishments that form with a size above the cut-off, and (b) does it capture establishments that formed with a size below the cut-off but have since grown in size
to cross the threshold;
5
6
Under the new Corporation and Limited Liability Law of Afghanistan (2007) individuals and businesses who want to become legal
entities in Afghanistan (corporations, limited liability companies, partnerships and Sole proprietors seeking traders or investors license),
need to register with the newly created Afghanistan Central Business Registry at Ministry of Commerce & Industry. Since the inception
of the ACBR until the third week of November 2009, 13,655 business have being registered (mostly from Kabul), with 4,426 submitting
their registration forms through AISA and the rest directly to ACBR ,” quoted from paper by Sanath Jayanetti, study of GDP data
commissioned by DfID, December 2009.
CSO may also wish to consider adopting a uniform employment size cut-off for all sectors, so as to facilitate comparison
with area sample data as well as make the data more user friendly. The present cut-off varies between 50 workers for
manufacturing to 30 for services. A cut-off of 20 workers is common in some countries.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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b. Does the register include establishments (or enterprises) that are, in reality, out of
scope, for example, closed or below a cut-off. This would occur if, for example,
CSO failed to track these establishments, or, failed to declare them closed or out
of scope even after having tracked them and found them to have closed or to have
fallen below the cut-off.
What is seldom understood is that the A risks are far more important than the B ones. The
reason is simple. If the unit is selected for a sample, the B group of errors can be detected
during a field survey of registry units – that is, it will become known that the establishment has closed or fallen below the cut-off when a visit is made to the establishment.
Moreover, in the case of Afghanistan, the establishments above the cut-offs are obligated
to submit quarterly reports to CSO, and these reports could be used to update the status of
establishments that have closed or fallen below the cut-off. Accordingly, the fact that
among some 1800 listed establishments at CSO nearly half may have closed or be out of
scope is not actually such a big problem, although it is puzzling why these establishments
are not more promptly removed from the list of active, in-scope ones as CSO acquires the
relevant information.
In contrast, the A risks cannot be detected during a survey of registry units, because the
problem units lie outside the list of registry units. There is, however, one tested, reliable
method for estimating the number of missed units. This is to conduct a survey involving
two samples: a list sample, based on the register, and an area sample, based on selected
areas that are canvassed door-to-door. The trick then is to use the area sample to prepare
lists, for the sample areas, of all establishments that appear to be in-scope for the list sample in terms registry cut-offs, then to match the suspect establishments in the area sample
against the list sample for the same area. Establishments that appear in both samples
should appear only in the survey tabulations for the list sample and not those for the area
sample. If some establishments from the area sample are found to have been missed from
the list sample, it would be useful to estimate their number and employment in the
population, after applying the appropriate blow-up factors.
This is an analysis that could have been done in connection with the recent Integrated
Business Establishment Survey (IBES), but such an analysis may not have in fact been
fully carried out. In May 2009, the IBES was carried out in Afghanistan, involving two
samples – an area sample and a list sample. The list sample was based on a list of some
1800 large establishments kept by CSO, while the area sample was based on a sample of
small areas. A draft report on the survey is under review, but full tabulations are not yet
available. Similar surveys will need to be conducted every year or two in future and
should be designed to shed more light on the question of registry under coverage.
Although there has been much discussion of the need for a Census of Establishments to
update the register, it must be understood that a census is a very blunt, ineffective, and
inefficient tool for updating a business register. Experience in other countries, including
Ghana and Sri Lanka, has in fact shown that an Establishment Census can miss many
large establishments, for various reasons including difficulties encountered by enumerators in entering an establishment. For these reasons, it is essential to develop a strategy
and set of procedures for register updating based on the ACBR and other suitable administrative sources first, before holding a census. It would be much more useful to conduct a
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
16
Census of Establishments once a CSO business register has been rebased on the ACBR,
at least for those provinces for which the ACBR is operational. Furthermore, when an
Establishment Census is finally conducted, it is essential for enumerators to carry establishment lists from the registry with them, sorted down to the village level. Subsequent to
a census, it would become important to consider developing sampling methods for establishments, in order to replace the system of obligatory reporting where appropriate.
2.7
Indicators of job growth or job creation
Many userrs have expressed interest in indicators of job growth or job creation. Such
data, it must be said, are normally taken from establishment surveys or establishment data
from administrative records – for systems that have comprehensive data for small and
medium enterprises and new ones. A household survey is normally not the source for
such data, because the respondents will not know about the previous history of their job.
In order for the establishment data to shed light on this issue, it would need to be collected in ways that are far more comprehensive and reliable than is now the case. For the
time being, job creation in the private sector is unlikely to have a large impact on a labour
market in which all salaried workers (including government workers) account for only 12
percent of the employed, according to NRVA 3. For now, it would more realistic for
policy-makers to focus on proxies for job creation, such as:


The number of salaried jobs in private establishments, which could come from the
NRVA or a module to it;
The number of new business licenses issued. The new ACBR licensing system could
in principle produce a useful indicator as it appears to cover the smaller establishments as well as the large ones. This indicator would, however, only be reliable once
the ACBR has expanded to cover the country and has mopped up the backlog of
existing firms that need to register. Furthermore, such an indicator would be far more
useful if it showed the number of jobs at each new establishment.
2.8
Survey of Agriculture
The need for a Survey of Agriculture and its relationship to the Census of Population and
Housing (CPH) are discussed in Annex B on the Capacity Building Plan and will not be
repeated here.
2.9
Consumer Price Index
It is also intended to extend CPI coverage to more provincial capitals, eventually covering
most or all capitals. At present the published CPI covers only six cities: Kabul, Herat,
Kandahar, Mazar-e-Sharif, Jalallabad, and Khost. Data has been collected for four more
cities (Kunduz, Badakhshan, Helmand and Bamyan) but has not yet been used to compute
local price indexes nor included in the national CPI. It is planned to incorporate data for
the four cities into the CPI, to extend CPI data collection to four more cities in 2010, and
further to extend the CPI to additional cities in 2015.
A major difficulty in expanding CPI coverage for Afghanistan is the lack of convenient
channels for sending the data to Kabul. Post is slow and not very reliable. Internet would
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
17
provide a much more speedy solution, and the need for such a link is discussed further in
the section on ICT.
2.10
Analytical Studies and National Accounts
The major focus of analytical studies in the CBP was in support of the national accounts,
and the major focus of national accounts work discussed here is to improve data sources
for the accounts. The rudimentary nature of the accounts – still using the System of
National Accounts (SNA) 68, production and expenditure accounts, with a large part of
the expenditure account derived as a residual, no input-output or supply and use tables ,
can be traced to the meager source data available to the national accounts team.
Two studies proposed in the CBP involved utilizing the IBES and the HIES data for national accounts, and this goes into the ANSP as well. It is essential as well to review the
obligatory questionnaires that establishments use to file their quarterly reports. Although
the questionnaires have been upgraded in the last year or so to include for the first time
use of intermediate product, they are not yet optimally designed in support of the accounts.
Table 2.1
Conspectus of Sources for Value Added Estimates in National Accounts
Wheat and paddy rice
Real annual estimates based on crop cut surveys
Other food crops
Estimated using rough methods based on market prices & traded volumes
Perennial horticulture
Qualitative assessments based on extension agent reports.
Opium
Resin estimates by the United Nations, area cultivated estimated by the UN and
USAID using remote sensing methods.
Livestock
Rough estimates in the absence of a livestock survey. NAD collects scattered
interview data with slaughterhouses.
Intermediate consumption in
No data is available for this.
agriculture
Output of bakeries
Purposefully sampled bakeries in Kabul area.
Textiles, leather, wood
Data collected by the ESD from obligatory quarterly reports by large factories.
products (incl furniture), &
paper products
Mining & quarrying
Data from the Ministry of Mines
Construction -- modern
ESD collects from the Ministry of Public Works, MRRD, Ministry of Finance and
other line ministries. NAD collects data for modern private construction with
non-response common.
Construction -- informal
No data is collected for this, assumed to equal the modern sector.
Wholesale & retail trade
Based on a commodity flow model with fixed coefficients. No use is made of
data collected by MoF and AISA from registered trading companies.
Restaurants and hotels
An annual survey is taken of 6 restaurants and hotels in each nahia, purposely
selected from a list of state-owned enterprises. Ratios from the survey are
applied to the estimated number of State-owned & private establishments in
Kabul.
Air transport
ESD survey of Afghan airlines
Buses, trucks, taxis & other,
NAD collects its own data through purposive surveys.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
18
informal, modes
Banking & finance – formal
Da Afghanistan Bank
sector
Insurance, informal money
NAD collects its own data through purposive surveys.
changes & real estate
services
Ownership of dwellings
NAD collects its own data in certain Kabul neighbourhoods
Community, social &
NAD collects data on gross revenue and intermediate consumption using gross
personal services
receipts and the number of people engaged in these institutions.
Government services
Budget of the central government
In the ANSP, an annual review of NAD data needs is planned, including efforts to
identify priority, feasible ways to obtain the required data for both formal and informal
sectors. If this process can be continued for a number of years, it will probably lead to
improved quality for the national accounts.
Table 2.1 provides a summary of the main sources used for the measurement of GDP
from the production side. It can be seen that the sources are fragmentary; for many commodities the NAD must rely on qualitative data or data collected from small, purposive
samples. The table is based largely on an ongoing DfID study and, for the sake of brevity,
omits many details that are presented in that study.
Due to the lack of producer price data, consumer prices are used as needed to represent
producer prices. For the GDP by expenditures, data sources are even thinner. The NAD
would like to utilize the NRVA for estimating consumption, but needs to understand
better how such surveys tend to understate true consumption by large percentages, especially in developing countries.
In sum, the major obstacle to the progress of national accounts in Afghanistan is the paucity of source data, so that the path to progress must lie in enhancing the source data. The
first steps in that direction would be to review the gaps and identify those that appear easiest to fill. Obviously, the IBES will provide a new source that could be used to re-estimate GDP for 2008 and perhaps to create a new benchmark for GDP.
The NAD intends to produce a technical handbook on how GDP is estimated. The NAD
would also like to begin to announce schedule for releases and for revisions, and then to
strive to meet these schedules. This is, of course, an IMF requirement for GDDS, so it
would be good for CSO to move in this direction.
2.11
Data Quality Assurance
Data quality assurance is key to a well-functioned and well-regarded statistical system.
Ensuring that the data are reliable and that they are perceived as such by users is
paramount to the usefulness of CSO products and services. Data quality assurance and
monitoring function is essential to ensure high quality data are produced and used.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
19
Different areas of the statistical production need to be addressed. This includes a
monitoring system, central quality assurance functions, dissemination of information
about quality, and user feedback.
CSO could make considerable improvements in data quality assurance by:

Developing a quality policy - providing guidelines, a framework for definition of
quality objectives and standards, and a commitment to satisfying user needs.

Developing quality tools at all stages of data collection – including design, field
monitoring systems, quality and performance indicators and measurement
systems, quality control systems, self administered quality checklists.

Developing a process to review quality of analysis and reporting.

Training staff in quality awareness, principles and procedures, new standards,
principles and methods of quality improvement.

Developing a program of quality reviews to take a comprehensive scrutiny to
address specific data sets (e.g. CPI, household surveys).

Implementing the quality policy – including continual quality improvement and a
quality evaluation program.
2.12
Data analysis
CSO currently does relatively little analytical work. The benefits of conducting more
analyses would be threefold. First, the results are of intrinsic interest in their own right to
users. Second, they stimulate interest in the statistics on which they are based, and
increase credibility and visibility of CSO. Third, they put the CSO in the position of a
user, and hence better able to see the strengths and weaknesses of the statistics produced.
Comparisons with data from other sources are invaluable in checking the quality and
coherence of the data and identifying possible problems.
Although the analysis is not and will never be its core function, the CSO needs to develop
its capacity in this area. The CSO will not become the leading centre on economic
analysis and forecasting but will work to enhance the analysis function and to make its
presentations of statistics more informative. Routine publications of the CSO will benefit
from the improved analytical infrastructure. The results will include better visibility, more
graphs, more trend estimates, and generally more descriptions and interpretation of
official data and survey results.
To improve analytical capacity and products, CSO could conduct the following activities:

Identify the user needs for analyses, in consultation with users.

Improve the analytical skills of relevant CSO staff.

Develop analytical methods and conduct analyses to meet needs.

Establish a standard set of analytical tools to be used in statistical presentations.

Systematically improve description, analysis, and interpretation with every data
release.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
20

Develop more in depth analysis including forecasting for national account
statistics.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
21
3 Census of Population and Housing
The Census of Population and Housing (CPH) is covered in section C of the ANSP and
the Action Plan but is not budgeted there, as the CPH is expected to be funded separately
from the rest of the Plan.
The ANSP includes a CPH, which is now scheduled for 2011 after having been
postponed more than once. The last national population census was in 1979, so that
current population estimates are based on projections from 1979. UNFPA has begun
major efforts to prepare CSO for the CPH. These efforts include:





Support for a nationwide Household Listing (HHL) in 2009;
Support for a Geographical Information Systems (GIS) unit at CSO so that it could
print maps for the household listing and so that it can prepare corrections to the maps
based on findings of the listing;
Preparation of a training program to prepare CSO staff for census operations, a
program that is about to be launched;
Preparation of a budget for the CPS itself, with UNFPA arranging for donor support,
and;
Discussions with other donors about a broad program to assist in raising SCB at CSO,
so that it will have the capacity to conduct and analyze the census.
CSO plans to carry out a pilot census in 2010, with some pilot activity in every province,
and to follow this with the full CPH in 2011 if the security situation permits and if training at CSO in CPH-related skills has proceeded to a sufficient extent. Following review
by the International Census Advisory Board, in early 2008, a draft questionnaire for the
CPH was shortened and simplified, to accommodate the limited capacities of most enumerators. CSO is also prepared to implement the census flexibly in conflict areas:


In some districts, it may be necessary (and possible) to co-opt Taliban cadres for conducting the census. Similar methods have been used for the NRVA;
For other districts, it may not be possible to conduct a census but estimates could still
prepared pegged to the HHL and supported by remote sensing. Hopefully the number
of such districts could be kept to a minimum. As a point of comparison, it is worth
noting that many districts in Sri Lanka were omitted altogether by censuses during
the long conflict there, but censuses still took place in the safer parts of the country.
The HHL itself, now nearly complete, will provide valuable demographic data for Afghanistan. In particular, it will provide the number of households per village, and this
number could be used to prepare a synthetic estimate of the number of persons per province (and, with less precision, per district), with estimates of the average household size
per province and for major cities, using NRVA data – average size for the country is 7.3.
Although some remote settlements may have been missed by the HHL, due either to oversight or to poor security conditions, techniques exist for estimating the number of missed
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
23
housing units from remote sensing – which provide an effective data source for Afghanistan, a country with relatively clear skies and minimal forest cover.
Given the usefulness of the HHL, questions may be raised as to the need for a full census.
Yet the need for a full census is, in fact, compelling. Beginning with broad considerations, in the context of learning by doing, a population census is a very powerful exercise
for building statistical capacity, as it involves large numbers of staff and contract workers
in basic and (for the most part) not overly challenging statistical tasks. At the same time,
it will be a particularly challenging task for CSO to manage such large databases (covering upwards of 4 million households), and this will require the development of a high
order of database management skills. The capacity to control quality in the field also
needs to be developed.
The holding of a national census is moreover a powerful statement of nationhood, second
to an election but still very important. The commitment to hold a national census is embodied in the London Compact (2006) and the Paris Declaration (June 2008). Yet, for
these reasons alone, there will also be a major risk of disruption of the census by elements
hostile to the GoA.
More fundamentally, the data provided by a census are of vital and irreplaceable value;
these include the population of each village by age, sex, and socio-economic characteristics such as educational attainment, labour force participation, economic activity and
family structure. The critical need for such data was mentioned by several agencies during a survey of data needs. More specifically, the data are needed for the Afghanistan
National Development Strategy (ANDS), to provide baseline measures and as a basis for
planning down to the village level. As expressed in a draft UNFPA analysis, “No other
data source than a Population and Housing Census can provide such primary information
at the national, provincial, district, Nahia, and village levels; allow for a comprehensive
gender analysis of population-based indicators; or serve as a basis for population projecttions and estimates at the required points in time and levels of functional or geographic
disaggregation.” 7 In sum, if the Government of Afghanistan wishes to move towards
evidence-based policy-making, a CPH appears to be a natural place to start.
Furthermore, the CPH head counts and characteristics are needed to develop a household
master sample, which can then serve as the sampling frame for all subsequent household
surveys such as the NRVA, MICS and HIES. Such a master sample is needed to control
the representation of various socio-economic groups in a sample, the composition of
which would depend on the purpose of the survey.
The question is often asked how to develop district-level data for Afghanistan, due to the
yawning disparities in welfare levels among districts. The most obvious path for preparing such data is through a CPH, because only a census involves visiting every household
in the country. Other alternatives include administrative data where this can be developed
with sufficient reliability, for example for school enrolment. The other alternatives, such
7
UNFPA, “A Strategic Program for Strengthening CSO, Building its Capacity, and Conducting the 2010 Population and
Housing Census”, undated draft but appears to have been written around January 2009.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
24
as sample surveys, are not feasible for producing data at the district level, as the cost
would be excessive.
The potential for developing synthetic estimates of poverty by district based on socioeconomic indicators in the CPH should not, however, be ignored. Poverty measures by
district are much sought after by planners. Direct poverty estimates by district are not
feasible for Afghanistan given the large number of districts (400) and the large sample (at
least 250 preferably 500 households per district) and long questionnaire that would be
required for that purpose. Synthetic estimates, however, are feasible based on the NRVA
poverty data and a multiple-regression model that relates the poverty status of each
household to characteristics such as family structure, age, labour force participation, economic activity, educational attainment, province, and urban-rural status.8
8
Andrew Pinney, “A proposed census-household survey architecture for Afghanistan”, note circulated by email on 2
December 2009.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
25
4 Institutional Development and Capacity
Building
4.1
Organizational Development
The tasks discussed here are shown in section A.1 in the ANSP and the Action Plan. Pay
scales at CSO are very low, even after being raised by CSO participation in the government’s Priority Restructuring and Reform (PRR) system. A university graduate with three
years experience will receive only about $150 per month. Such low pay scales create poor
incentives for performance on the job and professional development. The low scales
could become an even more acute problem when a major project starts at CSO, raising
the risk of sharp resentment of the high salaries of international and national consultants
and major disappointment at a lack of additional rewards for CSO staff. Two approaches
are proposed for alleviating this problem:


A broad increase in pay scales (to a range of $100 to $600 per month) is available under the GoA’s Pay and Grading (P and G) system. The system requires, however, that
the agency prepare written job descriptions for all employees. It is recommended that
CSO strive to qualify as soon as possible for P and G, in particular by preparing the
required job descriptions. One or more national consultants may be needed to help
with these preparations. It may, however, be the case that CSO must wait its turn in
the queue for adherence to P and G and is not in a position to take any steps in that
direction on its own.
CSO should stand ready to pay appropriate bonuses for work that is well completed
in the framework of the ANSP, using some donor funds for that purpose. It will be
best if payment is clearly linked to cases where good work has been carried out and
deserves a modest reward. The payments must not be seen as a right for all
employees.
A related issue is how to attract more graduates of universities and two-year diploma
courses to CSO. Persons with such credentials would be far more trainable than persons
with only a high school degree. This problem needs to be examined more closely, as it
may depend not only on pay scales but also on the kinds of job slots authorized for CSO.
Finally, there are three “housekeeping matters” that CSO wishes to address during the
ANSP:

Refinements are needed in the Statistics Law of 2006. Among other things, these
refinements would clarify the legal position of CSO, provide a full guarantee of statistical confidentiality for data provided to CSO, even in cases of criminal prosecution, and specify the legal process for selecting the President of CSO. These proposed
changes have already been submitted to the parliament. Further delays in the
legislative process, while unfortunate, will not obstruct any other parts of the ANSP.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
27


CSO needs administrative restructuring to add to the number of departments, in particular to break up the Department for Sampling and Field Operations, into several
departments, including GIS, data processing, database administration, and field
operations.
Enhanced public finance management at CSO.
4.2
Provincial Statistical Offices
There is also the issue of how to develop the 34 Provincial Statistical Offices (PSOs) with
a series of tasks of graduated difficulty, including household and establishment surveys.
The PSO’s have existed since the Seventies and were more active then, but have in the
intervening years fallen into low performance. This problem requires a focused needs
assessment by a team including an international consultant. The difficulty is how to design a series of tasks that meets CSO needs while also facilitating a process of learning by
doing at the PSOs. At present, the 34 CSO’s have a total of 140 permanent staff and about
80 contract employees, with more staff per PSO in larger provinces such as Kabul and
Herat. Few PSO staff have either 16-year or 14-year degrees. The key missing ingredient
is learning by doing, not training. CSO lacks data on the number of computers in the
PSO’s, but one PC was recently distributed to each PSO, and the total is believed to
average about two to three units per PSO. Most PSOs, however, are not connected by
internet with CSO; it is expected that such a connection would help motivate PSO’s to
become more diligent in collecting statistics.
In other countries, it is normal for provincial staff to have much deeper experience in statistics than was observed in at the Herat PSO, where the seven staff members had no experience collecting data in the field other than price data for the CPI and the obligatory
data forms from establishments. Furthermore, staff had limited background in statistics
work, having moved to the PSO from jobs in other agencies over the past six or fewer
years. By contrast, in Mongolia and Belarus, seniority at the regional statistical offices
was observed to be much higher than at headquarters, with well over half the staff having
served in statistics more than 10 years. In Indonesia, it is normal for national headquarters
staff with management potential to be rotated into leadership positions in provincial and
district statistical offices in the course of their careers.
4.3
‘Learning by doing’
For the sake of motivation and immediate improvements in the CSO’s products and
services, the main purpose of training should be to develop skills to be applied on the job
soon (see Annex D – motivational issues). If, instead, staff are trained in topics that
cannot soon be applied on the job, the value of the training will not be clear and staff may
lose interest or soon forget what they have learned.
This consideration suggests that the most powerful force in support of capacity
development may not be training per se, but continuous on-the-job (OTJ) learning that
comes from sustained participation in a recurring operation such as collecting or
processing survey data. Training will help largely insofar as it supports such OTJ
learning. Conversely, training will be of less use if it provides skills that are not in
demand now or in the immediate future.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
28
This approach is central to ANSP and cuts across all components - from household
survey operations, to preparation of National Accounts, to dissemination and data
management as well as administration. Routine household surveys will constitute a key
“learning by doing” activity at the CSO under the ANSP, because of their routine nature they facilitate statistical capacity building at the CSO with a series of tasks that will
provide good learning opportunities without overburdening its nascent capacity.
Eventually they should involve the Provincial Statistical Offices (PSOs) as well as
headquarters staff. However, the same approach is required in other areas, anchored first
in elements of those areas which can most easily be built into a routine.
‘Learning by Doing’ will rely heavily on the attitude and ability of the consultants to
genuinely support CSO staff and transfer skills.
The approach will require the following in particular (but not exclusively!):

Coach and transfer skills from consultants—who are placed to work with CSO
staff on project activities--to CSO staff across all project activities, under the
CSO management structure, in order to help build sustainable and
institutionalized systems. This includes sensitize training to trainers and experts.

Foster a culture of learning by urging CSO staff to ask questions and absorb
know-how. Provide coaching sessions to CSO staff targeted for ‘learning by
doing’ to make the most of the coaching and training opportunities. Organize
feedback sessions for CSO staff and consultants to take stock of the learning
process progress. Encourage CSO staff to make presentations and share their
learning with colleagues.

Measure progress and learning achievements regularly and adjust approach across all ANSP components and sub-components, for example, dissemination,
household survey operations, National Accounts, data management,
administration, and project management.
4.4
Training
The tasks discussed here are shown in section A.2 of the ANSP and the Action Plan. In
the absence of on-the-job experience, it is sometimes assumed that training can play a
large role in raising capacity. Yet, although knowledge and understanding of statistical
methods is much needed at CSO, the success of a training program cannot be taken for
granted. Instead, success will depend on several factors including:


Trainee motivation. It cannot be assumed that staff will eagerly seize any opportunity
to learn, in the wake of 30 years of low performance by CSO amid a society still torn
by war and disorder. Factors motivating employees towards opportunities to learn are
discussed in more detail in annex D;
The perceived usefulness of what is being taught. If the material being taught is said
to be, and is perceived to be, highly relevant to a task that the trainee expects to
perform in the near future, the trainee is far more likely to pay attention than in other
cases. To take another case, if a trainee is being taught theories of sampling, whereas
he or she knows that CSO does not and never has implemented any sample surveys
on its own in recent memory, the trainee will be much less likely to pay attention, no
matter what the skills of the teacher;
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
29


The selection of trainees. Trainees may or may not be selected to benefit optimally
from a certain training, in terms of existing knowledge and motivation to learn. If the
training is simply over their heads, or if they usually work in a different area from the
one being taught, they are unlikely to benefit;
The knowledge and communication skills of teachers. Teachers are far more likely to
be successful if they: (1) have a solid command of the material to be taught on the basis of both theoretical understanding and practical experience, (2) speak the same language as trainees, and (3) have a good understanding of the backgrounds of trainees,
in particular of what they do and do not already know. These considerations suggest
that a teacher who is based in Kabul for several years and speaks Dari is far more
likely to succeed than a visiting teacher who speaks English and spends only a few
weeks in Kabul. It would unreasonable to expect too much from translators who may
be assigned to assist foreign teachers. Unless the translators themselves have a deep
understanding of the statistical issues, they are unlikely to succeed in translating with
sufficient accuracy and empathy to bridge the language gap between teacher and
trainees.
Given the multiple risks of failure in training, CSO needs a well-structured training program, one that is designed to meet various operational requirements and the needs of
various groups of trainees. Furthermore, any large scale training program at CSO needs
built-in metrics for evaluation, so that both teachers and trainees can promptly know
when there is progress and when there is none. Only in this way can CSO management
consistently control for the above-mentioned risks of failure. It is therefore proposed that
CSO design separate training strategies for three kinds of cases: (1) training for immediate operational application, (2) intermediate-term training to raise on-the-job skills in a
broad way, and (3) long-term training to raise general skills in a broad way,. Other kinds
of training – for example, training for a specific purpose but with no immediate operational application – should be kept to a minimum, at least until CSO accumulates far
more experience with the first three kinds of training. The proposed metrics for evaluation are as follows:
For training for immediate operational application, the metric is a simple one. A test
should be given by the instructor at the end of the course, with results to be reported to
trainees and to management, and to be stored in a training database. Subsequently, the extrainees will begin their operational assignment, and OTJ success or failure can be at least
casually correlated with training scores.
For intermediate-term training to raise OTJ skills broadly, it is proposed that CSO institute a simple system of certificates for levels of statistical knowledge. For a start, there
could be four such certificates – two for high school graduates, and two for diploma or
university graduates. The two levels would be “beginning” and “intermediate”. For example, a “Beginning Statistician” with a high school diploma would be expected to have
certain specific levels of knowledge in regard to: Arithmetic, algebra, basic statistical
concepts (such as mean), basic computer skills, and a small English vocabulary. An
“intermediate” certificate would involve higher levels of knowledge, and perhaps some
simple skills in technical writing. Higher standards would be set for certificates awarded
to university graduates. The task would then be for CSO, together with international and
national consultants, to specify the standards in detail, with technical guidelines for them,
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
30
and to prepare sample tests that would measure whether staff qualify or not for the certificates. CSO could offer staff an opportunity once or twice per year to take the tests.
Table 4.1
Conspectus of training needs at CSO
1. For High school graduates
1.1 CSO training for OTJ use in
Testing would be useful but is not absolutely necessary, as OTJ
near future.
performance will provide a good indicator of the usefulness of the
training.
1.2 CSO training in basic skills,
A simple system of CSO certificates for 2-3 levels of basic knowledge for
including basic math, interviewing,
HS grads would provide a clear evaluation tool for CSO & for the
basic computer, basic English.
trainees themselves. Use consultants (international & national) to
develop the standards and testing tools.
1.3 Customized university program
CSO should seek to partner with a local university to develop a custom-
for 2-year diploma – in-service
ized 2-year in-service diploma program for HS grads. Provide small
(part-time) study.
scholarships to CSO staff who can pass entrance exam & who perform
satisfactorily as students.
1.4 Support for part-time in-service
Again, CSO should provide scholarships for in-service students with
B Sc study – suitable for HS grads
suitable study programs and satisfactory progress. CSO can seek
or diploma holders
partners for this among local universities.
2. For university graduates
2.1 CSO training in advanced skills
Focus on specific types of knowledge that will be utilized OTJ very soon,
for university grads – based on
so that trainees will be motivated to master and apply what they learn.
immediate OTJ needs.
Don’t train in skills that will not soon be utilized.
2.2 CSO training in basic skills for
Again, a simple system of CSO certificates for 2-3 levels of basic know-
university grads
ledge for university grads would provide a clear evaluation tool. Use
consultants to develop the standards and testing tools.
2.3 Build up statistics department at
Work together with Economics Faculty at Kabul University to shape a
U of Kabul, so it can offer stronger
program that will provide statistics graduates for CSO and line agencies
stats curriculum &, eventually,
with data collection programs. Aim for both enhanced BSc & MSc
masters
programs. Use foreign teachers, if possible Dari speakers.
In addition to trainees, other staff could be allowed to take the tests, on a voluntary basis,
on the basis of outside learning (for example at a university) or self-study. The certificates
could then be used by CSO for some decisions in regard to job assignments, and perhaps
as well in regard to bonus payments, in ways to be decided by CSO management. In addition, the certificates would serve as confirmation to trainees of their own levels of knowledge and the opportunity to earn such a certificate would motivate staff to strive to acquire knowledge. Finally, the system of certificates would also provide CSO with a strong
indicator of institutional progress in SCB. Training courses designed to raise the general
understanding of staff should be designed with the goal of preparing trainees for such exams, and the exam results would in turn provide a valuable metric for the utility of various trainings. On the basis of experience, it may be necessary to modify the standards
from time to time to assure a better fit between the certificates and OTJ requirements.
CSO will consider outsourcing the testing process for certificates to a local university that
could provide assurance of reliability and impartiality.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
31
As regards longer-term training, the data on the educational qualifications of NRVA staff
shows the importance of general education for enumerators. Diplomas and degrees are
also a prerequisite for higher levels of trainability in more complex tasks. It is proposed
that CSO seek partnerships with local universities, so as to benefit from their experience
and skills, and their commitment to quality education. This can be done in three ways.



9
Partner with a specific university (perhaps a private one) to develop a two-year parttime diploma program that would combine general knowledge – mathematics, English, computer skills, writing skills – with two kinds of specific skills that are needed
by CSO -- basic statistics and technical writing. Given the scarcity of statisticians in
Kabul, the basic statistics course might have to be taught by a CSO staffer. The technical writing course could be taught by a teacher at the university using some simple
writing examples gleaned from CSO staff. Project funds could be used to provide
small stipends to qualified in-service students who are enrolled in such a program.
There are about 300 CSO staff in Kabul with educational attainment of only 12 years
and many of these would probably be interested to take advantage of such an offer
because of the gain in prestige and earning opportunities from a diploma. 9 In the
United Kingdom, a similar arrangement exists between the Office of National
Statistics (ONS) and Southampton University in support of a two-year program for an
MSc in Official Statistics;
Partner with a specific university (not necessarily the same as for the 2-year diploma)
to develop a department of statistics with the capacity to award bachelor’s and master’s degrees. A department of statistics does exist in the Faculty of Economics of
Kabul University; it had stronger skills in the early 1970’s, but statistics professors
were lost during 30 years of war, so it now has weak skills. The program could be
revived by bringing in foreign professors who could teach many of the courses for a
few years until Afghan professors can be trained. Foreign professors who could learn
to teach in Dari would be especially valuable; Iran would be a good source for such
teachers, and has provided at least one in recent years. If suitable programs could be
developed at a university in Kabul and one or two foreign professors (one for statistics, sampling and related skills, another for demography and other skills such as
technical writing and official statistics) could be brought to Kabul for five or six
years, it should become possible to select talented Afghan students for overseas study
and subsequently choose some as university teachers in Kabul, thereby to revive the
teaching of statistics in Kabul. Many of the graduates of such programs would be
available to work in Kabul, at either CSO or another agency. This is, to be sure, a
long-term strategy, but may have a good chance of helping in a major way to build
sustainable statistical capacity over the long run;
Offer CSO employees who want to enrol in in-service university programs for a BSc
a small stipend in support of their study at a local university on condition that they
qualify and maintain a good academic record. It remains to be seen whether such a
program needs to be confined to a single university or not. It is assumed that the number of staff who would wish to take advantage of this offer might be less than for the
There is perhaps some risk that the existence of such a program will encourage persons with a high school diploma to seek
employment at CSO in order to enrol in an in-service degree program, but this is not necessarily a bad thing and can be
managed by setting quotas for the number of high school and university graduates to be recruited each year. At present,
CSO faces difficulty in luring university graduates due to its small pay package. The linkage of recruitment to the number of
available slots at CSO needs to be reviewed to clarify how it impacts on the inflow of university graduates.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
32
two-year degree program, as the study would take much longer. Again, however, the
opportunity to obtain a degree would substantially motivate some employees.
The above guidelines can serve as a starting point for developing a training strategy for an
agency that begins from a very low level of statistical performance. More diversified strategies will eventually be needed to deal with more specific tasks and skill sets. Meanwhile, scholarships for study outside Afghanistan will continue to be needed for many
years, at least until a strong Department of Statistics can develop at a university in Kabul.
The plan is to send two students each year for master’s study in statistics or demography
and two for bachelor’s study. This training, however, is costly and involves a high risk
that the student may not return to CSO.
A training needs assessment together with proposed training solutions is planned for early
2010, to investigate training needs and options in more detail, to examine the opportunities for collaboration with local universities more thoroughly, and to prepare a detailed
schedule for implementation. The assessment will be conducted by a team consisting of
an international consultant and the advisor to the General President of CSO, Mr. Esmatullah Ramzi.
Meanwhile, CSO needs to proceed with training that is urgently needed for CPH preparations. The topics include: Basic math, basic statistics, basic computer, financial and
budget management, questionnaire design, data editing and imputation, CS Pro, demographic analysis, socio-economic indicators, GIS/cartography, and database management.
4.5
Statistical Infrastructure
International agencies have promulgated various standard classifications for statistical
use, and national statistical offices are expected to use these as frameworks for developing national classifications in their own language, with local examples. CSO has not yet
begun to do this, and now proposes to do so, beginning with the most-frequently used
classifications:




The International Standard Industrial Classification (ISIC);
The Central Product Classification (CPC);
The Harmonized System (HS) for imports and exports;
The International Standard Classification for Occupations (ISCO).
After a CPH, a Master Sample is often prepared in other countries for use in drawing
samples until the next census. It contains information about the socio-economic characteristics of the population in each of the areas identified for the Master Sample, and facilitates the process of drawing a sample according to the requirements of any particular survey. Good GIS information will be important in support of the Master Sample.
A Business Register is recommended for purposes of tracking births and deaths of large
and medium establishments as well as for use as a sampling frame. CSO has a list of
about 1800 large and medium establishments that it updates from year to year, but there
are serious questions about both the completeness of the list and about its possible in-
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
33
clusion of many out-of-scope establishments. This matter was discussed in sub-section
2.6.
4.6
Dissemination
As a modern statistical agency serving the needs of many other agencies at the national
and local levels, CSO is committed to creating a transparent environment that will maximize the opportunities to use its data. CSO will soon begin to sell its Statistical Yearbook
and other publications without requiring a letter and will take steps towards providing extensive source notes in the yearbook that will assist users to interpret the statistical data
and to assess any apparent anomalies. CSO is developing its website. An early version is
now online, and further enhancements are anticipated soon. After the new site is fully
built, the next task will be to post data on the web. For a start, CSO could post monthly
updates for the CPI and trade data, as well as frequent updates for national accounts.
Another critical form of data dissemination has to do with micro-data. When dissemination of micro-data is restricted, as used to be the case in many countries, data users are
limited to analyzing the tabulations released by the statistics office. This greatly limits the
usefulness of the data. Year by year, however, it is becoming more and more common for
statistical offices to disseminate micro-data (with identifying information removed) in the
form of databases for use by researchers. Users are no longer satisfied simply to receive
tabulations of the data and wish instead to be given the opportunity to make their own
tabulations based on their own needs or hypotheses. For this reason, the practice is less
and less to hoard data on computers within the statistics office and more and more to
share access with outside users and researchers, while of course disguising the identity of
the respondents.
Increasingly, moreover, statistical offices are using the web to enable users to query
micro-data sets online. In this context, CSO wishes to do its part to make its data available online, starting with the results of the HHL down to the village level. This would lead
to a massive improvement of data use in Afghanistan, and would raise the profile of the
CSO considerably. Care is needed of course to respect guardianship of the CSO and confidentially of the respondents.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
34
5 Administrative Data
CSO collects administrative data from many GoA agencies and uses this data to prepare
its national accounts and to publish in the Statistical Yearbook. In addition, some line
agencies collect some survey data; increased coordination is needed for such data as well.
The administrative data is collected through standard CSO forms that each line agency
must fill out; many of these forms were developed in the Seventies and Eighties and have
not much changed since then. For example, one question asks each agency how many
vehicles it operates. The Ministry of Public Health (MoPH), for example, perceives the
question as outdated, as it ignores the fact that over 80 percent of primary care is carried
out not by the MoPH itself, but by NGOs on contract with the MoPH.
CSO has long collected data from line agencies, but the situation is now changing as
some line agencies develop their management information systems (MIS) in a substantial
way. It is now proposed to conduct a statistical audit that will take stock of the available
data from line agencies and, at the same time, examine whether the agencies could collect
other data through their MIS, data that would benefit both the line agency and CSO. In
addition, the audit will give CSO the opportunity to consider whether CSO should change
the way in which it collects data from the other agencies. If, in addition, it is wished to
review simultaneously the suitability of the administrative data for the purpose of monitoring the Afghan National Development Strategy (ANDS), consideration would need to
be given to harmonizing CSO’s role with that of other coordinating agencies.
The audit process will begin with a pilot study for auditing, capacity building and data
development at three agencies, funded by UNDP. The agencies are: Ministry of Women
Affair, Ministry of Labour and Ministry of Commerce and Industries. After the pilot,
there will be an assessment of its implications for further work at line agencies in terms of
a statistical audit as well as possible steps for building capacity at MIS and statistical
units outside CSO.
In addition, the pilot will also provide study tours and other activities to enhance statistical activity in the other agencies. UNDP has agreed to fund the pilot in the amount of
$150,000.
An interesting possibility is for CSO to build statistical capacity in other agencies by providing training. However, this approach will require a very careful needs assessment, for
two reasons:


As a rule, other agencies will be in far less need of sampling or other statistical skills,
since most of their activities involve administrative data. It would be misguided to
train the agencies in skills that they do not need;
It will be far more difficult for CSO to assess the training needs of other agencies and
to assess the usefulness of training for staff of those agencies than for CSO itself.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
35
Article 5 of the Statistics Law of 1 Jan 2006 created a National Statistical Council (NSC)
-- a recommendation of the 2004 Statistical Master Plan -- to be chaired by the Vice-President of the Islamic Republic and scheduled to meet twice a year. The council, however,
has not yet played an active role in coordinating statistical activities across agencies. In
order to improve coordination, the NSC needs to create a technical committee that could
meet more frequently and discuss matters at a technical level.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
36
6 Information & Communication Technology
ICT has played a leading role in recent capacity building at CSO, particularly for census
mapping by the GIS unit and data entry for NRVA by another unit. During the next years,
ICT will continue play an important role in SCB in Afghanistan. Each PSO now has at
least one computer that was distributed in 2008, and many have more than one, but a full
count is lacking. The PSOs do not as a rule have internet connections or scanners. CSO
now proposes to connect all of the PSOs to internet at a cost of $2,000 per office.
Electricity supply is not reliable in many PSOs, and in such cases CSO supplies
generators and fuel so as to operate computers when needed. An internet connection
would make it much easier for the PSOs to send data, such as CPI data, and to receive
instructions. Scanners would become quite useful for PSOs when they are connected by
internet. A monthly payment for internet service in the PSOs will be required but the
amount is not yet known.
Table 6.1
Inventory of PC’s & Peripherals
Personal computers
Printers
2002
47
2002
15
2004-05
26
Pre-2005
7
2007
55
2006
15
2007
5
Scanners
Plotters
2004
2
2005
1
2006
2
The stock of computers at CSO needs to be modernized and expanded gradually. A recent
casual count of computers at CSO found 173 units, of which 51 were in the computer hall
and the rest in individual offices; many of those in individual offices were said to be broken or not very usable. An inventory of computers at CSO based on available administrative data showed only 128 units, of which 47 were Compaq’s from 2002, 21 were Dells
from 2004-05, 5 were Samsungs from 2005, and 55 were Dells from 2007. Many of the
42 PC’s that are missing from this inventory are likely to be old. All these PC’s will be
replaced in stages, at a rate of 30 per year. In addition, CSO plans to add 15 PC’s per year
for use in individual offices and in PSO’s. All PC’s need to be provided with Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS) units. In addition, the stock of printers needs to be modernized:
22 of the 42 units in use are from 2005 or before, and another 15 are from 2006; these
will gradually become outmoded during the life of the ANSP. Finally, CSO needs more
scanners, beginning with one for each PSO. Only three are shown in inventory for CSO,
none are known to be used in the PSO’s.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
37
Upgrading of the network and servers is also needed, but specifications for this are not
yet available. The GIS unit at CSO now utilizes hardware and software that are fairly new
and are adequate for the task. GIS activity will begin to wind down during and after the
planned CPH, but a small GIS unit of, say, five staff should be maintained in preparation
for the next census. For this unit, equipment and software would need to be replaced in
2013, by which time it would be five years old.
Software at CSO needs to be upgraded. As Windows 7 is now appearing on the market,
this would be a good time for CSO to negotiate a mass purchase of Windows 7 licenses at
bargain rates, in anticipation of its acquisition of many new PC’s under the ANSP. An
important side benefit would be that users could download the Microsoft antivirus package for free, so there would be no need to purchase anti-virus software separately. Viruses
are rampant at CSO, with many PC’s lacking protection. CSO also needs SPSS and
STATA licenses.
Finally, CSO needs to move towards establishing a data warehouse to manage some of
the databases for which it already serves as a repository – HHL 2005, NRVA, IBES – and
to anticipate the databases that will be created by the CPH and the surveys that are
planned.
The SuperSTAR application (www.str.com.au/SuperSTAR.htm) provides a generic solution for data warehousing needs, one that is designed for on-line analytic processing
(OLAP) and avoids the need to custom program a system for CSO. The application uses
built-in international metadata standards. “SuperSTAR is an OLAP package developed
especially for national statistical offices. This is a package that is used by many developed countries national statistical offices, and is widely considered to be the industry leader
in the field of OLAP of the survey and census data. It is yet to be used widely in the developing world, but there are existing successful implementations with the national statistics office is in Tanzania and Namibia. The UN is beginning to show interest - FAO is
currently negotiating a SuperSTAR licence for FAOSTAT data. Significant discounts are
available to the United Nations system and developing country statistical offices for what
is otherwise very expensive software.”10 Similar programs may be on offer by other vendors as well, so CSO does not need to develop its own application along these lines.
10
Andrew Pinney, “SuperSTAR online analytical processing software for improving access to the data of a national statistical
system”, a note prepared for the Cambodian statistics office. See also: “White Paper: SuperSTAR for Statistical Agencies”,
Space – Time Research, January 2007.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
38
7 Physical infrastructure
The main physical infrastructure investment under the ANSP would be the construction
of a Statistical Training Center (STC) within the existing perimeter of the CSO grounds.
The building would include three stories above ground plus a basement, for a total of four
stories, each 13 x 18m, equivalent to 234 square meters, so the total floor space for all
four floors would be 936m. It is estimated that the cost of the basic building would be no
more than $600,000, while the cost of finishing and equipping five rooms for training
would be no more than $150,000. In discussions about the need for an STC, some concern has been expressed about whether training activities at CSO will really be as intensive as anticipated in the CBP of 2008. Even if training activities are less intensive than
anticipated, however, much of the space in STC would eventually be needed as working
space for CSO staff, most of whom now work in cramped conditions, with four or five
persons to a room. The need for additional space would develop as educational levels
rise and more and more staff are assigned their own PC.
It is also intended that the STC would provide space for a statistical library with internet
facilities and a dissemination unit including a print shop in the basement. The cost of the
library is shown separately in the action plan, while the cost of the dissemination unit is
not included in the plan.
A final task for physical infrastructure is the construction of PSO offices and the rehabilitation of the PSO office for Kabul. Most of the PSOs lack their own separate office buildings, instead they occupy a room in a provincial government office building. A much
more challenging task, however, will be to integrate the PSOs fully into capacity building
activities, particularly those involving learning by doing. For this reason, CSO will focus
on capacity building at the PSO level, with construction of offices proceeding stepwise
and playing a supporting role. This task is recommended for GoA financing, and will be
suitable for implement in two or three provincial capitals per year.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
39
8 Project cost and administration
Administration of the project will involve both a Project Implementation Unit (PIU) and an advisory group in statistical capacity building (SCB). The PIU
will track budgeting and monitor implementation. It will be headed by an international consultant and staffed mainly by national consultants, with CSO
staff involved to the maximum extent feasible.


The PIU will document budget requirements and actual spending; this will satisfy donor requirements and will also provide CSO with experience in
managing transparent budgeting and procurement procedures;
Monitoring is needed to support quarterly progress reports on implementation as well as systematic comparisons between plans and implementation.
This activity will provide CSO staff with experience in managing project implementation.
Overall, a flexible approach is recommended for planning the work. Given both the difficult situation in Afghanistan and CSO inexperience in collecting
field data, delays are unavoidable. Inflexible planning was one of the reasons cited for the failure of an earlier ADB project to raise capacity at CSO.
For advisory services, a twinning arrangement is recommended, subject to competitive tendering. This would involve a standing arrangement with a
statistical agency in a more advanced country or a consortium of such agencies to provide consultants for SCB and to coordinate their work to ensure a
harmonized approach. Involvement of a statistics agency would help ensure the coherence of advice from the various consultancies to be provided and a
consistently professional approach.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
41
Annex A – Analysis of NRVA and MICS
questionnaires
An analysis of the lengthy questionnaires used for NRVA 2007-08 (see table 1) shows
that expenditures accounted for one of the 14 sections in the men’s questionnaires and
one for the six sections in the women’s questionnaire. In sum, therefore, expenditures
accounted for two of 20 sections, or 10 percent, in terms of sections. Nevertheless, the
percentage of time (in terms of the average number of minutes required to complete the
sections) must have been much higher than the percentage of mere number of sections,
given the level of detail involved in a full expenditure module.
Table 0.1 Questions in NRVA 3
Male Questionnaire
1
Household Register
9 questions, repeated for all HH members
2
Housing and Utilities (includes Water)
44 questions
3
Livestock
16 questions
4
Agriculture
57 questions
5
Assets and credit
27 questions, with 5 repeated for up to 13 kinds of
durables
6
Education
11 questions repeated for members age 6+
7
Disabilities
15 questions for all HH members
8
Sources of Household Income
4 questions, 3 repeated for multiple activities.
9A
Labour for members 6-15 Years of Age
16 questions repeated for members 6-15.
9B
Labour and migration of HH members 16 years +
34 questions repeated for members 16+
10
Cash-for-work and food-for-work
11 questions
11
Migration and Remittances
15 questions repeated for members who’ve moved
12
Household Expenditures
32 questions
13
Household Shocks & coping strategies
6 questions, multiple answers allowed.
14
Final male interview questions
10 questions
away.
Women’s Questionnaire
15
Food consumption in last 7 days
Only 6 questions, with 3 repeated for dozens of
commodities.
16
Iodized salt, avian flu, HH expenses
11 questions
17
Number of children born and marriage information
27 questions
for “ever married” women
18
Recent births (children born since August 2005)
28 questions
19
Immunization and child health – for children under
30 questions
5
20
Women’s activities (for all females in HH, ages
44 questions
10+)
The draft MICS questionnaires have been analyzed, and the results are shown in table 2.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
42
Table 0.2 Questions in NRVA 3
Male Questionnaire
1
Household Register
9 questions, repeated for all HH members
2
Housing and Utilities (includes Water)
44 questions
3
Livestock
16 questions
4
Agriculture
57 questions
5
Assets and credit
27 questions, with 5 repeated for up to 13 kinds of
durables
6
Education
11 questions repeated for members age 6+
7
Disabilities
15 questions for all HH members
8
Sources of Household Income
4 questions, 3 repeated for multiple activities.
9A
Labour for members 6-15 Years of Age
16 questions repeated for members 6-15.
9B
Labour and migration of HH members 16 years
34 questions repeated for members 16+
+
10
Cash-for-work and food-for-work
11 questions
11
Migration and Remittances
15 questions repeated for members who’ve moved
12
Household Expenditures
32 questions
13
Household Shocks & coping strategies
6 questions, multiple answers allowed.
14
Final male interview questions
10 questions
away.
Women’s Questionnaire
15
Food consumption in last 7 days
Only 6 questions, with 3 repeated for dozens of
commodities.
16
Iodized salt, avian flu, HH expenses
11 questions
17
Number of children born and marriage
27 questions
information for “ever married” women
18
Recent births (children born since August 2005)
28 questions
19
Immunization and child health – for children
30 questions
under 5
20
Women’s activities (for all females in HH, ages
44 questions
10+)
The question arises whether MICS and NRVA could be combined in a single survey.
Comparison at the level of questionnaire sections indicates the likelihood of considerable
overlap between questions in the MICS and NRVA 3. It is difficult, however, to see how
the two surveys could be combined inasmuch as MICS itself (being the more comprehensive survey in terms of the health of women and children) involves long, exhaustive questionnaires for each woman and child under five in the household. Moreover, the MICS
includes specimen collection and anthropomorphic measures that require some specialized training. NRVA for its part is likely to evolve into a core NRVA questionnaire that
will not include so many questions about the health of women and children.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
43
Annex B – Comments on CSO Capacity Building Plan: Items for Omission or
Re-specification
Nr
Reviewer’s comment
CBP proposal
Proposed disposition
A. Institutional Development and Capacity Building
A.1
Organizational Development
A.1.2
Directory of Statistical outputs
Quarterly
A.1.6
Conduct of Basic Training
Continuous 892,320
A.2
Statistical Infrastructure Development
A.2.1
More useful if presented not as a directory but in the form of extensive source and technical notes to
the Statistical Yearbook & web links.
Re-specify. Annual is
sufficient.
Do a careful training needs assessment first. A scattershot approach to training is unlikely to have
much impact on capacity, a strategy is needed addressing motivation and certification issues. Need
to break out basic & advanced training. How many trainees per level?? Need also to focus mainly
on 2 kinds of training: that for prompt operational application & that for certification.
Re-specify to clarify
training strategy (see
report)
Development and Implementation of
Household Master Sample 2-times; 62,000
Once is enough, should follow CPH in order to utilize characteristics found in CPH.
Once after CPH.
A.2.3
Development of Sampling Design for
establishments surveys 2 times 44,000
This might make sense after census, but such a census is not scheduled yet and should be
preceded by exploratory studies.
Do after Establishment
Census.
A.2.4
Updating the List of Establishments
4 times 480,000
The need for this kind of field work is unclear, as it should be possible to update the list of existing
establishments at minimal cost through routine reports. The question mark has to do with the
Omit until a clear strategy emerges.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
16,800
45
possibility that large, new establishments are somehow missed; this needs to be tested.
A.3
ICT and Physical Infrastructure Development
A.3.6
Re-construction of CSO Printing Press
One time 158,400
CSO clearly needs equipment for printing forms, such as census forms; this is being provided by
UNFPA in connection with CPH. Whether CSO also needs equipment for printing books at this time
is not so clear. Few books to be printed each year, still more efficient to outsource than to build
capacity for publishing books.
Omit.
A.3.8
Provision of 11 cars for Department
Directors
The cars are due to CSO by law; therefore, would be funded by the GoA. However, this step is not
essential to SCB.
Omit
A.3.9
Provision of Motorcycles for 364 District
Officers One time 218,400
Unnecessary at this time. There are no district officers as yet, only provincial ones. If this is needed
for census, census should cover the cost
Omit
A.3.10
Maintenance and Repair of vehicles Regular
560,000
Repair costs on vehicles previously donated to CSO will be paid by the CPH budget and can be
dropped from CPB.
Omit
A.3.11
Renovation of CSO Kabul Office
One time 65,000
This task is in line with the construction of new PSO buildings so the Kabul project will be grouped
with the construction of PSO offices.
GoA should pay.
A.3.12
Construction of Statistical Training Center
One time 1,768,400
4 stories, 900 m2. Needed in support of training effort, library and printing department. The cost can,
however, be cut by more than 50% by focusing on 2 priority aspects: Basic construction, & finishing
of 5 training rooms.
Re-specify with smaller
budget.
This is a survey of offices – government, private and NGO’s. Begun in 2009, to be finished in 2011.
One time. COST?
Do once and then
review. No need to plan
for repeats.
B. Strengthening CSO Position & Enhancing its Visibility
B.1
Household Sample Surveys
B.1.1
Survey on Participation of Women and Men
in Decision Making 3 times 615,000
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
46
B.1.2
Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey,
3 times, 4,500,000
UNICEF sponsors. This is a very detailed HH survey that focuses on health of children & mothers.
Impossible to combine with NRVA. MICS previously done in 2003, with poor success.
Do once as already
planned, 2010.
B.1.3
Labour Force Survey
Annual 15,394,000
Afghanistan does not need a separate annual LFS. Unemployment is not a very meaningful concept
here due to the small share of salaried employment in the LF. Employment numbers would be useful
once every few years. No need for a separate LF survey, collect as an occasional NRVA module.
Re-specify as NVRA
module.
B.1.4
Household Income and Expenditure Survey
3 times 15,394,000
Last done 1987. Much needed for rebasing CPI weights. However, the survey technique is quite
demanding on enumerator capacity. Best therefore to begin with an HIES for Kabul alone (sample
1000 hh), to be followed by the other cities in a year or two.
Kabul HIES in 2012.
Other cities in 2014.
B.1.5
Child Labour Survey
Would be suitable as an occasional module for an annual NRVA. Has never been done.
Re-specify as NRVA
module.
B.1.6
National Demographic Survey
One time, 1,510,000
This would overlap considerably with MICS. Never been done and not needed soon.
Omit
B.1.7
National Health Survey
One time 1,430,000
This would also overlap considerably with MICS. Not needed soon. Was done by MoPH in 2006.
Omit
B.1.8
National Risk and Vulnerability Survey
2 times 10,400,000
A core survey is needed annually for tracking poverty. Use modules for special topics. 21,000
households. To adjust for seasonal variation, best to collect data four times per year. Call it MultiPurpose Household Survey.
Annual core survey,
starting 2010, with
modules from 2012.
B.1.9
Census of Agriculture
One time 71,000,000
A Census of Agriculture has never been done & is not so urgently needed as a CPH. Moreover, the
CPH can be used as a sampling frame for broad agricultural surveys, since 55 percent of
households are involved in agriculture. FAO experts can help design.
Re-specify as survey, to
be implemented 2 yrs
after CPH.
B.2
Establishment Statistics
B.2.3
Small-scale survey on Agriculture One time
72,000
Combine with the survey mentioned under item B1.9.
No separate survey
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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Annex C - The demand for data
C.1 Main findings
Interviews were conducted with representatives of seven agencies, six of them outside
CSO. The main findings:
1. Detailed population data, down in some cases to the village level, was the most
frequently and emphatically mentioned data item. This data can only be known
through a census. The existing projections are sorely out of date, as the most recent census was held in 1979;
2. Trade data were mentioned by three agencies, one of which (the central bank)
raised issues about data reliability;
3. CPI data were mentioned by three agencies;
4. Labour force data were mentioned by three agencies, two of which mentioned
employment by sector and three of which specifically mentioned unemployment.
The usefulness of unemployment rates for Afghanistan will be discussed below;
5. National accounts were mentioned by only two agencies;
6. Detailed sectoral data from the household survey (National Risk and Vulnerability Survey, or NRVA) were mentioned by two agencies;
7. Surprisingly, poverty data was mentioned by only one agency.
This kind of “popularity contest”, although it provides useful insights, cannot by itself be
used as a reliable basis for setting statistical priorities, for three reasons. First, the reasons
that prompted people to mention certain data items and to neglect others are not always
clear. Second, nor is the logic behind certain data requirements always clear, as will be
explained in the case of unemployment data. Third, some of the required data is difficult
to obtain and unlikely to be collected by CSO in the near future – such as data for capital
stock, foreign direct investment (FDI) and some of the other data required by Da Afghanistan Bank (DAB). In contrast, other data items, such as those mentioned by the Ministries of Education and Public Health, are suitable for collecting in household surveys and
are in fact well available from the NRVA.
Another source for reviewing data demands is the monitoring plan for the Afghan National Development Strategy (ANDS), which appears in the first annual report on implementation. This monitoring plan, however, did not take account of data availability for some
sectors, and is now being revised at the recommendation of the monitoring unit in the
Ministry of Economy. In future, it is recommend that CSO create a small team to work
with the sectoral agencies as they formulate their monitoring plans, to ensure that data
availability and the feasibility of collecting any new data at CSO are duly considered
when preparing monitoring plans. Indeed, in the formulation of desired ANDS outcomes,
it would be well to avoid (as much as possible) targeting outcomes that are difficult to
monitor. Unfortunately, it was not possible to discuss data needs with the various UN
agencies, as most of their international staff was withdrawn shortly after this consultant’s
arrival in Kabul.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
49
C.2 The unemployment rate
The interest in knowing the unemployment rate appears to stem from a need to plug the
rate into macro-economic models that are borrowed from more developed countries. It is
suggested that analysts look for ways to substitute other, more sensitive indicators of
labour market slack for the unemployment rate.
The unemployment rate is critical for monitoring labour demand in advanced economies
in which most workers (often 90%) have wage and salary jobs, making them highly dependent on employers, and where governments provide partial earnings replacement to
the unemployed, enabling them to remain in an unemployed status for long periods. In
less developed countries, however, wage and salary employment is relatively rare, and the
predominant "status in employment" categories are instead self employment and family
workers, who rarely find themselves unemployed, although their earnings may be abysmal. In Afghanistan, the NRVA found that salaried employment accounts for only 12
percent of employment, while day labourers account for another 20 percent.
As no unemployment compensation system exists for Afghanistan, most people simply
cannot afford to be unemployed. A person without a job will have no choice but to engage in some kind of income-seeking activity that, under the ILO concept, is considered
employment. Day labourers, in particular, may not be much subject to unemployment in
Afghanistan because wage rates probably fluctuate to clear the market. In advanced countries, the stickiness of wages contributes substantially to the unemployment problem.
A meeting at CSO in late October provided a fine example of the confusion about “unemployment” in Afghanistan. The NRVA for 2007-08 had yielded an unemployment rate of
7 percent, and the President of CSO was distressed by the disgruntlement of the Minister
of the Economy over this finding of a low rate. Much time was spent discussing whether
this finding should be withheld or presented in a different context so as to undercut the
disappointment of the Minister of Economy and his stated refusal to accept this finding.
The discussion provided an excellent lesson in the low utility of the unemployment concept for Afghanistan.
India, at least until recently, conducted a Labour Force Survey only once every 5 years, in
large part probably based on similar considerations about the questionable utility of an
unemployment measure. This may have changed recently as the Indian economy has
begun to develop more rapidly.
The NRVA found that the poverty rate was about the same for unemployed and employed
persons, showing that unemployment has little impact on welfare in Afghanistan. Moreover, it found that persons who worked more than 40 hours a week had very high poverty
rates. All these findings point to the conclusion that: the main labour market problem in
Afghanistan is not unemployment but inadequate earnings. A more buoyant labour market would certainly tend to raise earnings, but it is unclear whether the unemployment
rate can serve as a sensitive indicator of labour market buoyancy, as the unemployment
rate here appears to be mainly sensitive to a small segment of the labour market.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
50
*
Ministry of Finance
***
**
*
**
*
*
*
**
***
Other needs mentioned
National accounts
Illuminate discrepancies
Poverty rates by province
**
Trade data
**
CPI
Da Afghanistan Bank
Employment by sector
Unemployment
Population
Conspectus of Expressed Data Needs
User
Table C.1
Capital stock by sector,
citizens living outside
Afgstn, remittances, FDI,
Improved trade data to
minimize discrepancies.
Regional GDP by zones.
**
Ministry of the Economy
Ministry of Rural Reconstruction and Development
***
Accurate population
data at village level.
Ministry of Education
***
Ministry of Public Health
***
Need population
by district & age, literacy
rates, enrollment rates,
out-of-school kids.
Need population by
village & by age,
if possible. Also
health characteristics
World Bank
**
**
Sources:
Da Afghanistan Bank
Ministry of Finance
Ministry of the Economy
MRRD
Ministry of Education
Ministry of Public Health
World Bank
National Accounts Dept, CSO
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
** **
** **
National Accounts Dept, CSO
*** -- Emphasized by user
**
** -- Mentioned as important
Matiullah Faeeq
Zia-Ur-Rahman Haleemi
Moh. Rahimi Ismail
Craig Naumann
Paul Curran
Hameedullah Sherani
Dr Moh Ashraf Mashkoor
Dr. Yoichiro Ishihara
Ismail Naimi
Establishment data,
HIES for reweighting
of CPI baskets.
* -- Mentioned in passing
DG, Monetary Policy Dept
Head, Fiscal Policy Unit
Poverty Expert
International Development Consultant
MIS Advisor
Systems Analyst, EMIS
National HMIS consultant
Senior Economist, Kabul office
Head
51
Annex D – Motivational Issues and the
Historical Context
As mentioned in the 2004 SMP, CSO and the entire government are “emerging from a
period of prolonged civil disorder” and indeed of civil war, “with virtually everything
destroyed or non-functional. This is further compounded by shortages of virtually everything from finances, to continued security concerns in parts of the country, to a pressing
need to upgrade human resources, materials and equipment and improve the physical
working environment.” Under these circumstances, it is important when crafting a new
plan to take account of some challenging issues of “cultural change” (as mentioned in the
ADB TA assessment) and staff motivation. Real development, after all, requires creative
actions by many, many participants, without which big projects can fail no matter how
much funding is made available for the work.
Consider the implications of this model for training to build capacity. We begin with the
principle that successful training depends heavily on the motivation of trainees to strive
for professional advancement. This motivation, in turn, requires a long planning horizon
and confidence in the future on the part of each trainee. In, however, a context of poverty
and adverse working conditions, such striving cannot be taken for granted.
For the sake of good motivation, the main purpose of training should be to develop skills
to be applied on the job soon. If, instead, staff are trained in topics that cannot soon be
applied on the job, the value of the training will not be clear and staff may lose interest or
soon forget what they have learned. This consideration suggests that the most powerful
force in support of capacity development may not be training per se, but continuous onthe-job (OTJ) learning that comes from sustained participation in a recurring operation
such as collecting or processing survey data. Training will help largely insofar as it supports such OTJ learning. Conversely, training will be of less use if it provides skills that
are not in demand now or in the immediate future.
It is often urged that basic training should be provided to many CSO staff in order to improve their numeracy and understanding of basic statistical concepts. The question remains how to motivate the trainees to master the materials presented, to remember what
they have learned afterwards, and to seek additional knowledge on their own. One way to
do this would be to offer voluntary tests periodically, perhaps annually, which would
serve to assign a level of statistical knowledge to workers, with certificates to be awarded
for various levels. In addition to motivating trainees, such ratings would be useful in two
ways for CSO – they could (if it is wished) be used in selecting staff for promotion and
for overseas training, and they would provide an objective metric of the overall development of statistical knowledge at CSO.
For more advanced training, there is much to be said for building up a statistical education at a local university, perhaps Kabul University, as this would in the long run provide
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
53
a more disciplined framework for both developing training programs and testing what has
been learned, not to mention the prestige of a university degree.
The linkage of dissemination to capacity development deserves similar consideration. The
more widely the data are disseminated and used, in both aggregate and micro forms, the
more that users will focus attention on, and provide feedback to, CSO. This in turn will
create among CSO staff a feeling of importance that will motivate them to work better
and master the skills required. Conversely, to the extent that data is hoarded, users will ignore CSO and staff will lack a sense of the importance of their work.
Finally, a key issue in statistical capacity building that is often overlooked is the determining role of educational attainment. The potential for capacity development, whether
through training or OTJ learning, differs enormously between university and high school
graduates. The available historical information on the number of university graduates at
CSO confirms slow growth in the share of university graduates among CSO staff.
Obviously, statistical capacity at CSO could grow much faster if university graduates
constituted 20-25 percent of permanent staff instead of only 12 percent as at present.
It is not yet clear how the share of graduates could be increased sharply in the next few
years, but one possibility needs urgently to be explored. The ability of CSO to attract university graduates will depend greatly on remuneration relatively to that paid by other employers. As it happens, the new government pay system called Pay and Grading provides
for higher salaries, and CSO needs to get involved as soon as possible. Another possibility is for CSO to use some project funds to pay bonuses to staff for completed ANSP
work. This would help motivate staff to perform more effectively.
Another possibility is to explore ways that CSO could offer perquisites that would keep
staff attached for long periods. Other agencies in developing countries have had some
success with such an approach, despite low salaries. The perquisites range from apartments in some countries, to scholarships and opportunities to earn extra money through
statistical projects. One interesting possibility at CSO would be to explore ways to create
an educational program at Kabul University or a private university, specially designed for
CSO staff and offering the prospect of a diploma or bachelor’s by way of night courses. If
a suitable program could be created in a short time, project money could perhaps be used
to support the program and to provide scholarships for in-service students.
In planning for capacity development, in sum, staff motivation is fundamental. The main
thing is to manage successfully the factors that can either motivate staff to join CSO and
to learn and work or, conversely, undercut such motivation.
It is not clear to what extent statistical training for staff of statistical units in line agencies
of the government can be expected to lead to an improved flow of data from other agencies to CSO. Generally speaking, there is a fair prospect of success if one first builds a
system (for example, an MIS in a line agency), then provides training in how to use the
system, but not such a good prospect of success if one first provides training then expects
the trainees to develop an improved system of data collection. If CSO sticks to the principles mentioned earlier in this report, statistical training for staff of other agencies would
have to fall into one of the three cases mentioned in section 4.3 above.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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Annex E – Revised and annotated capacity building plan matrix for 2010-16
This is a list of activities which updates and strengthens, in view of the approach described under part I, an earlier plan that CSO prepared during 2008-09
called the “Capacity Building Plan” (CBP) or the “7-year plan”. The CBP was a rather costly wish list that was based in large part on inputs from data
users without adequate considerations for an overall approach and coherence. Recommendations of a previous Statistical Master Plan, presented in 2004,
were also reviewed, but the CBP, being more recent, was considered more suitable as a starting point for this list, from which the ANSP Action Plan
presented in part II was then derived.
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
A. Institutional Development and Capacity Building
A.1
Organizational Development
A.1.1
Workshops, Seminars and Conferences
Needed to improve communication with other agencies, users & the general public.
As needed.
A.1.2
Revisiting Statistics Law
Important, based on advice by UNFPA consultants from Iran. CSO has proposed to
parliament, but consideration has been delayed.
2012
A.1.3
Administrative re-structuring of CSO
UNFPA team proposed 18 departments, of which 10 for statistical areas.
2011 or 2012.
A.1.4
Study Tours for senior managers
Useful to develop a vision of what’s needed at CSO. Suitable for motivated senior
managers.
4 persons per year
A.1.5
Prepare to join the new Pay and Grading system for
civil servants.
This will require preparing job descriptions for all employees and other prerequisites.
National consultants can help to prepare the application.
2010-12
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
55
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
A.1.6
Prepare a strategy for using some project funds to pay
bonuses for results, as in some other agencies.
Without the hope of earning a bit more, there is a high risk that trained staff will fail to
see the advantage of donor assistance. Some may take higher paying jobs outside
the civil service.
2010
A.1.7
Develop a long-term strategy for increasing the share
of diploma and university graduates at CSO. Set goals.
At present the share is 13% for university grads and 5% for diploma grads. The
objective by 2016 is to reach xx% and xx%? Share to be increased by means of
additional slots for grads & a better compensation package (including perks).
2010-12
A.1.8
Utilize national consultants as needed, while avoiding
over-dependence.
Utilize national consultants selectively to (a) transfer knowledge and/or (b) do one-off
tasks that involve non-statistical skills.
Continuous
A.1.9
Build capacity in the PSO’s, based mainly on learning
by doing.
Assess PSO capacities then assign PSOs a series of tasks of graduated difficulty, so
that they can develop capacity with OTJ learning. Internet connections will support
this.
Continuous
A.2
Training
A.2.1
Training courses at CSO, designed for targeted impact
– in two components. (1) In support of CPH, (2) in
support of long-term capacity development.
Design training for targeted impact. For non-CPH, start slow with an enhanced
training program, to learn from experience. Identify evaluation metrics from the start.
Re-specify based on training needs assessment in 2010. Some part-time teachers
could be hired from universities in Kabul.
Continuous
A.2.2
To support CPH operations, offer short courses in
relevant subjects for staff who will have roles in CPH.
“Just in time” training – e.g., train for CPH just before CPH. Better to minimize use of
short courses for subjects that cannot yet be applied.
2010-11
A.2.3
Training needs assessment
Elaborate on a ramified, structured strategy for using training to build capacity in a
targeted and measured way while gradually developing a sense of commitment by
CSO staff.
Early 2010
A.2.4
Scholarship for Master's & Bachelors’ Degree in
neighbouring counties.
Each year 2 for BSc, 2 for MS. Can provide skills needed by CSO and serve as an
incentive for CSO staff.
4 person per year
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
A.2.5
Develop a system of certificates for basic competence
levels within CSO, then orient training towards
certification to provide benchmarks for trainees and
CSO.
Begin with a simple system of 2-3 levels of competence for high school grads, and 23 levels for university grads. Develop specs and tests for each level. Use national &
international consultants to develop the specs.
2011-12
A.2.6
Partner with a local university to develop a 2-year
diploma program customized for CSO staff.
Among 300+ high school graduates at CSO, many would be interested such a
program. Scholarships for in-service study for those who pass an entrance exam.
2012-13
A.2.7
Provide scholarships for in-service students who
pursue a bachelor’s degree in Kabul.
CSO needs to increase the share of employees with university degrees, and this is
one way to do so.
From 2011; preparatory
tests in 2010.
A.2.8
Partner with a local university to initiate development
of degree programs in statistics.
Develop plans to set up a statistics program and bring in professors from
neighbouring countries. The professors could also teach occasional short courses at
CSO.
2011-14
A.3
Statistical Infrastructure Development
A.3.1
Development and Implementation of Household
Master Sample
Follows CPH so as to utilize characteristics found in CPH.
2013 or 2014
A.3.2
Improvement of population estimates/projections
Critically needed by users. Can be done after CPH, or even after household listing if
CPH must be postponed.
2012-13
A.3.3
Development of Sampling Design for establishments
surveys
Not needed until after a Census of Establishments.
2016
A.3.4
Updating the List of Establishments
Cost of routine updating is minimal, but CSO needs first to conduct a pilot study to
investigate the completeness of the register.
A.3.5
International Standardization/ customization of
concepts & classifications
Begin with ISIC, CPC, HS, and ISCO
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
One classification per
year will suffice.
57
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
A.4
Dissemination
A.4.1a
Eliminate need for a letter for purchasers of the
Statistical Yearbook & other pubs.
Such a letter is only supposed to be required for free copies, but in practice is still
required as well for paid copies.
2010
A.4.1b
Add extensive source notes to Statistical Yearbook,
(formerly “Directory of Statistical outputs”).
The info will be more useful if presented not as a directory but in the form of
extensive source and technical notes to the Statistical Yearbook & web links so that
users can immediately view data.
Starting in 2010, with
results reflected in 2011
edition
A.4.2
Decide on dissemination policy & announce on the
website that micro-data is available to researchers
under certain conditions. Implement the policy.
A clear dissemination policy does not yet exist and many users are not yet aware that
the data (with identities removed) may be available for research.
2010
A.4.3a
Improvement of CSO Website: Phase 2
Phase 1 said to be nearly finished. Phase 2 is needed further to facilitate data
transfer.
Phase 1 2009, phase 2
2010-11
A.4.3b
Create an interactive web-based database for the
HHL, enabling users to define outputs meeting specific
needs.
The data on the number of households per village is important for planners at the
national and local levels, so that wide access to this data is appropriate. The data can
be configured in such a way as to protect the privacy of each individual HH.
A.4.4
Setting up of AFGHAN Info Center
The Afghan equivalent of DevInfo. Useful for dissemination, though based on old
technology. Work has begun. Link to CSO website?
2010
A.4.5
Analysis and documentation group, to produce and
update source notes in item A.4.1b.
CSO needs to develop a capacity for analysis and documentation of data that is
produced by CSO and by line agencies, with emphasis on evaluating consistency &
comparability.
Continuous
B. Collecting and Analyzing Data ( was Strengthening CSO Position & Enhancing its Visibility)
B.1
Household Sample Surveys
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
58
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
B.1.1
National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment (NRVA)
A core survey is needed annually for tracking poverty.21,000 households. To adjust
for seasonal variation, implement 4x per year. Rotate modules for special topics. Will
be useful for capacity building.
Core survey starting in
2010, with modules
from 2012.
B.1.2
Survey on Participation of Women and Men in
Decision Making
This is a survey of offices – government, private and NGO’s. Begun in 2009, to be
finished in 2011.
Repeat every 5 years.
B.1.3
Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS)
UNICEF sponsors. This is a very detailed HH survey that focuses on health of
children & mothers. Impossible to combine with NRVA. Previously done in 2003.
Planned for 2010, repeat every 5 years
B.1.4
Labour Force Module
Never been done. An annual LFS not needed, but employment numbers would be
useful once every few years. Make it an occasional NRVA module to save costs.
Coordinate with ILO and relevant ministry.
Do first in 2012. Repeat
once every 3 or 5 years.
B.1.5
Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES)
HIES uses a very detailed questionnaire, an expenditure diary, & its own sampling
plan, so cannot be combined with NRVA. Last done 1987. Best to begin with an HIES
for Kabul alone (sample 800-1000 hh), to develop CSO capacity. Follow with other
cities in 1-2 years. (Further discussed in Part I).
Kabul HIES in 2010.
Other cities in 2012.
Repeat after 5 years.
B.1.6
Child Labour Survey
Suitable as occasional module for an annual NRVA or could be combined with a LF
module.. Has never been done.
B.2
Establishment Statistics
B.2.1
Integrated Business Establishment Survey
Needed to cover establishments below the cut-off and to estimate under coverage.
(Further discussed in the “Analysis” report).
Biannual
B.2.2
Census of Establishments
Should take place subsequent to implementation of a satisfactory, regular register
updating method.
Not before 2014
B.2.3
Expanded Consumer Price Survey – currently
published data based on 7 cities.
First publish data for 10 provinces after analysis by an international CPI consultant.
Next, expand price survey to 14 provinces in 2010. Internet connectivity is needed in
Monthly
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
59
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
support of the expanded CPI.
B.2.4
Review quarterly establishment reports to maximize
benefit for national accounts
B.3
Analytical Studies/Computation of Indicators
B.3.1
Analytical use of HIES for CPI &National Accounts
Needed after HIES, to prepare a new market basket for the CPI.
2011 and 2013
B.3.2
Analytical use and tabulation of establishment data for
National Accounts
Needed after IBES.
2010
B.3.3
Developmental Study on Informal Sector
The study will design instruments for collecting data for the informal sector, based on
a few case studies.
2012
B.3.4
Review data needs for enhanced national accounts,
identify gaps, evaluate which ones will be easier to fill.
Difficult to upgrade national accounts without better source data.
2010
B.3.5
Review and revise obligatory forms for establishments.
The forms were designed during a period of socialist economic policy & are entirely
oriented toward state-owned enterprises. Redesign needed to take private establishments into account.
2011-12
B.3.6
Prepare a Supply and Use Table (SUT) based on the
Census of Establishments.
Important for re-benchmarking national accounts. Can begin 2 years after a Census
of Establishments.
Begin in 2016 at the
earliest.
B.1.7
Survey of Agriculture (replaces Census of Agriculture)
The CPH can be used as a sampling frame for broad agricultural surveys. 55 percent
of households are involved in agriculture. FAO experts can help design.
Implement 2 yrs after
CPH.
C.
Population and Housing Census
This will be important not only for the data to be collected and disseminated, but also
as an opportunity to build capacity.
2011 or 2012
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
These quarterly obligatory forms were recently revised to include intermediate
consumption; but further improvements may be needed.
60
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
C.1
Tabulate results of Household Listing
C.2
Prepare Census maps anew based on listing
Census maps were printed before HHL and now need to be updated.
C.3
CPH Pilot
To be carried out in selected areas in each province.
2010.
C.4
CPH: field work and data entry
To be carried out in 2011 if conditions warrant.
2011-12
C.5
Tabulate and publish CPH findings
D.
Administrative data in line agencies
D.1a
Conduct statistical audits at all line agencies
(approximately 42), starting with pilot for 3 agencies in
2010.
This will review statistical potential of existing systems, as well as data gaps. Will
identify data that can be used by CSO for National Accounts and Statistical Yearbook
& document classification issues. Will also propose new MIS systems where such
systems are lacking.
2010
D.1b
Continue audits at other line agencies at a rate of one
per month
Involve specialized consultants as needed.
2011-13
D.2
Identify standardization issues for administrative data
and issue recommendations case-by-case
The Statistics Law empowers CSO to provide guidance on classification issues.
Continuous
D.3
Revise CSO questionnaires for line agencies to adapt
to audit findings.
Most of the questionnaires were drafted at least 20 years ago and have not yet been
updated to take account of the current situation.
2012-13
D.4
Recommend upgrades to the MIS in specific line
agencies in order better to meet data needs for CSO
and for M & E.
Although the main function of an MIS is to meet the data needs of the line agency in
question, the systems can also produce valuable statistical data as a by-product.
CSO will recommend upgrades as needed to provide important statistical data as
well as serving an M&E need.
Continuous
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
2012 or 13
61
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
D.5
Facilitate the preparation & implementation of MIS
development plans in each line agency.
It remains to be seen how CSO can facilitate and to what extent training can play a
role.
D.6
The National Statistical Council (NSC), created under
the Statistics Act, will form an inter-agency technical
committee under the NSC.
The technical committee should meet regularly (quarterly) in support of inter-agency
cooperation for statistics.
E.
Information and Communication Technology (ICT)
E.1
Replace outmoded computers and printers.
There are presently about 170 PC’s at CSO and another 60 or more in PSO’s. Some are
already outmoded and all need to be replaced during the next 7 years.
Continuous
E.2
Provide additional computers and printers for use on
the desks of staff who need them
The stock of PC’s at CSO allows for only 120 to be used at the desks of CSO staff, with
many of these in poor condition. The objective by 2016 is for 200 (?) to be used at desks
of CSO staff.
Continuous
E.3
Upgrade network, equip servers with suitable programs such as SQL server.
Although CSO already has a LAN, little analysis takes place via the LAN.
2011
E.4a
Design and begin to create a data warehouse for CSO
data. This will facilitate access to and protection of key
datasets.
Although CSO has not yet collected much survey data, it is becoming the repository of
important data sets including the Household Listings and the NRVA data. As more data
is collected, this role can only increase, which will require effective ways of storing the
data to facilitate access.
2012-14
E.4b
Consider leasing a program such as SuperSTAR,
which has been used by many statistics offices to organize data storage with metadata to facilitate user
access.
The better that data in a data warehouse can be organized, the more accessible and
useful it will become. It will be much more cost-effective for CSO to purchase or lease
software for this purpose than to attempt to develop its own.
E.4c
For data owned by agencies other than CSO,
encourage the agencies to make their data accessible
For the purpose of sharing data, it is not necessary that all agencies submit their data to
a single coordinating agency; such a model has been difficult to implement elsewhere.
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
Quarterly
62
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
online.
Another option is that each of the agencies make its data accessible online.
E.5
Train a small, skilled team for database management.
Certify them with tests and provide incentive payments
to keep them.
The challenge will be both to train the team and to keep them employed without losing
them to outside employers.
2010-11
E.6
Expand Internet access to more CSO staff, eventually
to all PC’s.
CSO target is to provide internet access to all PC’s by 20XX. This will require purchasing
more bandwidth and developing appropriate administrative controls over usage.
Continuous
E.7
Purchase software as needed, include Stata, SPSS
and Windows 7.
CSO could negotiate a favourable price with Microsoft for equipping all PC’s with
Windows 7. Viruses are a common CSO problem; a systematic defence is needed.
2010-12
E.8
In the post-census era, maintain a core GIS capability,
for both hardware and software
GIS is important for mapping enumeration areas for the CPH, and for disseminating data
with thematic mapping.
Continuous
E.9
Computerization of personnel data base (Human
Resource Management System)
At present, CSO has difficulty in preparing tabulations that show how many new
employees, how many separations, per year, etc.
2011
E.10
Installation of Internet facilities in all provincial capitals,
@ $2000 apiece.
Essential support for improved data collection, e.g., for CPI. Post very slow, and hand
delivery can be dangerous.
2010-13
F.
Physical infrastructure
F.1
Construction of Statistical Training Center, a 3 storey
building with a basement.
Needed in support of training effort. Begin with building & training rooms. Library and
printing department can follow. (Further discussed in the “Analysis” report).
2010
F.2
Improvement of CSO Library
Useful as part of a package of steps to encourage self-study by employees. But
documents downloaded over internet are much more up to date than books
purchased in hard copy.
2012
F.3
Construction of buildings for 28 Provincial Statistics
Offices (PSOs) & reconstruction of Kabul office.
Begin with buildings in 6 hub cities, then show usefulness. A gradual approach will be
more acceptable to GoA.
2 PSOs per year
GOA funding
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
63
Nr
CBP proposal
Comment
When?
G.
Project management
G.1
If possible, establish a twinning relationship between
CSO and another, more advanced, statistical agency.
Such an arrangement has worked in Tajikistan. The other stats agency could play a
role in managing a SCB project at CSO.
2010
G.2
Review progress each year and reschedule tasks if
necessary.
Delays can occur.
Continuous
Afghanistan National Statistical Plan
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