Background

Monitoring of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and related regional and national development policies require national statistical systems to grasp the potential of innovative technologies in a rapidly changing data ecosystem while reinforcing leadership, coordination, communication and dialogue through institutional and organizational reforms, in compliance with the Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics, endorsed by the General Assembly in 2014. Modernization, transformation and adaptation are crucial if official statistics are to meet the widening and increasing requirements of policymakers, researchers, the media and civil society for high-quality, timely and disaggregated statistics.

Supporting this process of adaptation and modernization, the United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC) at its 49th session endorsed the proposed outline of the updated Handbook of Statistical Organization aimed at guiding chief statisticians and senior managers of statistical organizations in developing and maintaining statistical capacity that is fit for purpose. An advisory group was established with the task of providing overall guidance to the drafting team at United Nations Statistics Division and of ensuring a link with the High-level Group for Partnership, Coordination and Capacity-Building for Statistics for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and other relevant bodies. The UNSC suggested this approach being complemented with this series of thematic conferences at the regional and sub-regional level, at which senior statisticians may address recent institutional, organizational and technical developments addressing prospective challenges and opportunities for the production of official statistics and indicators.

Objectives of the Asian Thematic Conference

The main objective of the Asian Thematic Conference is to better understand and prioritise the emerging needs of statistical organisations in Asia to adapt and develop and exchange experiences and strategies of UN Member States in such processes. The regional approach will put emphasis on aspects of this process that are typical for Asia and represent common challenges among members within the region. The conference will also stimulate an exchange of information on national best practices as well as recent global and regional initiatives and programmes supporting the necessary transformation and modernisation of official statistics to address emerging user needs for high-quality and internationally comparable statistics and indicators.

The Asian Thematic Conference will allow the organizers to collect additional information on practices and challenges that will contribute to an extended knowledge base related to the new Handbook of Statistical Organization whose purpose is to guide chief statisticians and senior managers in developing, adapting and maintaining statistical organisations that are fit for purpose. The Handbook of Statistical Organization itself will be based on the strategic development areas mentioned in the Cape Town Global Action Plan for Sustainable Development and the outcome of the series of regional conferences on a transformative agenda for official statistics.

Conference Structure

The organizing committee of the Asian Thematic Conference suggested to structure the event around four main sessions covering the six strategic areas of the Cape Town Global Action Plan for Sustainable Development and nine strategic areas in the Declaration, and 14 substantive chapters of the forthcoming Handbook of Statistical Organization identified as highly relevant for Asia.

An initial outline of the draft agenda is provided below.

Session 1: Supporting the transformation of statistical production processes from the data collection to dissemination in the context of the digital and technological revolution.

This session will address the transformation and modernisation of the production architecture, processes and related technology, including the integration of innovative data sources for the compilation of official statistics and indicators. The session will also cover the development of innovative strategies and integrated platforms for data sharing and dissemination.

Session 2: Strengthening the institutional and organisational frameworks of national statistical systems

This session will address how to strengthen the institutional and organisational frameworks of national statistical systems. Interventions and discussions will also cover the role of national statistical offices as leaders and coordinators of these systems, as well as their partnerships with non-traditional data providers and the data community at large.

Session 3: Securing quality of statistical information and improving data coherence through statistical analysis and analytical frameworks

This session will address the relevance and use of national quality assurance frameworks that secure the production of official statistics and indicators meeting the needs of the various user groups, and how to interact with them in order to identify their needs and priorities. The session will also consider how analysis and analytical frameworks, such as national accounts and other domain-specific accounting frameworks, can address data inconsistencies and eventually improve the coherence of official statistics and indicators across various domains.

Session 4: Mobilizing and securing adequate resources and infrastructure, and promoting regional and global cooperation for the development of national statistical capacity

This session will discuss how to ensure effective means of mobilizing and securing adequate national resources, including human resources, and infrastructure, as well as how to promote and coordinating efforts at regional and global levels to support the implementation of country-owned strategies and programmes for the development of official statistics and indicators.

Breakout sessions:

Breakout sessions will serve as an overview of the themes of the workshop and will broadly cover all themes presented and discussed in various sessions. Participants will be split into groups and will discuss a set of prepared questions.

• The groups for both breakout sessions are defined along the following criteria:

  1. if a country or area is represented by more than one participant, these participants are allocated to different groups to focus on different sessions/ topics; 
  2. the chair and presenters of a particular session are requested to participate in a breakout session related to that session.

For each breakout session, groups will have approximately 1 hour and 15 minutes to discuss a specific set of questions prepared in advance. Each group will nominate a rapporteur; preferably from a country that does not have a specific role otherwise. The rapporteur can be the same for both breakout sessions or different, but must be a country representative. The designated rapporteur will deliver a short report in plenary on the main outcome of the discussions that will be commented by a small panel and eventually further discussed with all participants.

The objective of the breakout sessions is to identify and further discuss good practices, opportunities, lessons learned and challenges in managing a statistical organization in times of change. Participants will also be invited to propose ways to embrace opportunities and address challenges including through specific programmes and actions supported by multilateral and bilateral donors. It is expected that the reports and discussions in plenary will lead to the conclusions of the workshop including next steps/way forward and eventually proposals for future capacity building activities.

The outcome of the breakout sessions, allowing for the consolidation of knowledge and experiences shared, will significantly contribute to inform the updating of the Handbook of Statistical Organization.