Statisticians facing increased demands
Mon, 10/17/2016 - 12:00am
THE Region’s statisticians are faced with increasing demands to fulfil the requirements, for example, of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the Small Island Developing States Accelerated Modalities of Action (SAMOA Pathway) and the Community Strategic Plan 2015-2019.
This is according to Secretary-General of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), Ambassador Irwin LaRocque, as he observed the occasion of the 8th Caribbean Statistics Day, which has special significance given the endorsement of the Action Plan for Statistics by CARICOM Heads of Government at their 37th Regular Meeting.
This endorsement signifies the recognition of the vital role of statistics in enabling governments to confront the economic, social and financial challenges that they face in seeking to provide an improved quality of life for the people of the Community. It also recognises the support that must be provided to statistical offices and systems if they are to produce relevant, timely and high quality data to aid in decision-making.
In recognition of that endorsement, the theme for Caribbean Statistics Day 2016 on Saturday was “Improving the Lives of People – Advancing the Action Plan for Statistics in CARICOM”.
Ambassador LaRocque recalled that the Action Plan arose out of the Second High Level Advocacy Forum on Statistics (HLF), which was held in Grenada in May 2014.
“The Standing Committee of Caribbean Statisticians (SCCS) in its follow-up to the HLF identified key recommendations/actions required by Member States which included: The strengthening of the National Statistical Systems (NSS), and specifically the National Statistical Offices (NSO) through: the provision of adequate staffing and training of staff; updating of statistical legislation; transforming and modernising the NSO and NSS utilising the framework of the National Strategy for the Development of Statistics (NSDS); financial support including for the establishment of a continuous multi-purpose survey programme; and access to administrative data sources utilising IT networking data exchange arrangements in order to realise efficiency gains.”
“It also included promoting of careers in statistics through embedding statistics as a science in the curriculum of primary and secondary schools and enabling scholarships at the tertiary level,” he highlighted.
The Secretary-General of CARICOM therefore indicated that his intention is to monitor the advancement of the Action Plan for Statistics, since its success is integral to the improvement of the lives of our people as set out in the CSD 2016 theme.
“The SCCS must be commended for its role in facilitating the endorsement of the Action Plan,” he expressed.
“I encourage all statisticians to continue this thrust to ensure that high quality and timely statistics can be realised throughout the Community as we seek to anchor our sustainable development efforts in reliable and timely data.” (TL)