Seminar Conclusions and Recommendations

IV. Outcomes of the meeting

4. Seminar Conclusions and Recommendations

The participants of the seminar agreed on the following con-clusions and recommendations which would also apply to surveys and administrative records produced through the National Statistical System (NSS), where appropriate:

General

• Census data represent significant investment and constitute valuable and irreplaceable resources of a country. The long-term value of census data is greatly enhanced through proper preservation of data and accompanying documentations.

• Archiving encompasses a broad range of processes thereby requiring a clear and comprehensive strategy, starting from the census planning stage, as well as a sustainable organizational setting with proper supporting technology and adequate resources.

• It was recommended that NSOs include in their national census budgets resources for dissemination and archiving of micro-data. This would provide NSOs with the opportunity to explore the possibility of providing micro-data free of charge

Legal Framework/statistical laws

Although many countries in the region have statistical laws, they are out-dated in many ways. Out-dated laws need to be revised to better reflect current methods of census taking and use of modern technologies. The revised laws should ad-dress:

• dissemination and archiving of micro-data with proper documentation;

• retention of completed paper census questionnaires for a limited period of time depending on the situation in the country;

• the archiving a copy of materials used during census operation.

• data anonymization to ensure data confidentiality Technological infrastructure

• Participants pointed out the difficulties faced by their countries in keeping up with changes in technologies, given the rapid advancement of information technologies.

Limited skilled manpower and resources allocated for data archiving are among the common challenges to countries in Africa.　

• Participants recommended that NSOs monitor changes in technology and when necessary update software and

hardware for storing census data, as some countries have not been able to access and archive datasets that were stored using old technology. Countries requested that international and regional organizations, such as UNSD, UNECA, UNFPA, and the IHSN look into this issue.

Confidentiality

• The majority of countries have statistical laws which include clauses to ensure confidentiality of census micro-data. However, increasing demand for micro-data and advances in technology, pose challenges for provision of the data while maintaining data confidentiality.

• Participants recognized the mandate of the NSO in maximizing accessibility to and utilization of data, including micro-data, but stressed the need to maintain data confidentiality and not release individual identifiable data as this could erode public trust in the NSO.

Anonymization of microdata and dissemination

• As countries are increasingly providing access to census micro-data, appropriate methods or tools for anonymization of data need to be developed to reduce the risk of disclosure of confidential information.

Participants, however, pointed out that due to the diversity of anonymization tools and procedures, adequate guidelines are required in order to evaluate and compare them. Countries requested that international and regional organizations, such as UNSD, UNECA, UNFPA, and the IHSN look into this issue.

• Participant drew attention to the archiving and dissemination of data on sensitive and potentially sensitive topics, such as religion and ethnicity. Depending on the national context, countries should identify such sensitive topics and through appropriate anonymization procedures ensure non-disclosure of persons based on such sensitive variables.

Documentation

• Adequate documentation and metadata are necessary for data interpretation and utilization. Census archiving should include long-term storage of both electronic data and its affiliated documentation.

• Documentation covers the entire lifecycle of the census operation. It is therefore important to include it in the overall plan of the census and to undertake documentation at each stage of the census operation and not to wait until the end.

• It was suggested that countries use international data documentation standards for archiving thereby bringing together statistical data and accompanying documentation for better utilization and interpretation of the data. In this connection, the experience of a number

AfricAn StAtiSticAl newSletterBulletin d’informAtion StAtiStique AfricAin of countries in the region that are using the IHSN toolkit

as well as the Redatam-based IMIS for archiving of data is important. Use of these tools helps to standardize the information to be archived both within the country and among countries.

Data Storage and Security

• For long-term archiving of census data and documentation, countries are advised to put in place strategies for adequate storage and also for ensuring the physical and technological security of the data. Data security strategies should also cover plans for back-up, migration of data and meta-data files to new formats and media, use of off-site back-ups and also for disaster recovery.

• In order to ensure long-term accessibility and readability of census micro-data, it was suggested that a copy of

the raw and edited versions of the census micro-data be stored in ASCII format, which is easily read by all statistical packages available in the market.

Data Dissemination

• It was recommended that NSOs plan for and secure adequate resources as part of the data dissemination strategy at the beginning of the census operation.

• It was observed that, in the region, there is a trend toward data utilization by the private sector. Data dissemination strategies should take this new trend into account.

• Participants recommended that NSOs develop clear data access policies so as to ensure adequate utilization of census data. These policies should be periodically reviewed and revised as necessary. q

Expert Group Meeting On Compendium of Intra-African and Related Foreign Trade Statistics Negussie Gorfe, ACS

Background

Statistics Division has been one of the oldest divisions of ECA since its establishment in 1958. The Statistics Division at ECA has been producing recurrent publications such as the Afri-can Statistical Yearbook and others since its creation. In the area of foreign trade statistics three publications used to be produced by the Division namely, Foreign Trade Statistics for

Africa: Summary Tables; Foreign Trade Statistics for Africa:

Direction of Trade; and Foreign Trade Statistics for Africa:

Trade by Commodity. In 1997 the then Statistics Division published the first Compendium on Intra-African and Re-lated Foreign Trade Statistics by selecting the most relevant tables from the above mentioned three publications. This publication was produced on biennial basis starting in 1997 and was discontinued in 2005. The African Centre for

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tics is in the process of producing the publication commencing in 2011.

Organization of the meeting

The Expert Group Meeting (EGM) on Compendium of Intra-African and Related Foreign Trade Statistics was organized by the African Centre for Statistics (ACS) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) in Addis Ababa, Ethi-opia from 5 to 7 October 2011. The participants to the EGM were experts from national statistical offices (NSOs) and cus-toms offices of Botswana, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritius, Mozambique, Niger, South Africa, Tanzania, and Uganda, The meeting was also at-tended by experts from the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the African Development Bank (AfDB), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Devel-opment (UNCTAD), the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), and the World Trade Organization (WTO). In total twenty-two experts participated in the EGM of whom six were females.

Objectives of the meeting

The main objectives of the expert group meeting were:

• To review in detail the tables that have been included in the Compendium;

• To suggest which tables in the Compendium to be retained, removed, new tables to be added as well as advise on the overall format of the publication;

• To review the data sources used in the production of the Compendium and come up with additional and alternative data sources that could be used;

• To review the methodology followed in order to fill the data gaps and suggest ways on how to improve it; and

• To give feedback on the relevance of the data included in the Compendium.

Opening of the meeting

The expert group meeting was officially opened by Mr. Dimitri Sanga, Director of ACS. After welcoming the experts, the Direc-tor informed them how and when the Compendium was start-ed to be producstart-ed. He then urgstart-ed the experts to assist ACS by thoroughly reviewing the draft Compendium tables and come with suggestions on how to improve the quality and relevance of the publications. He further informed the experts that ACS has been working jointly with the African Union Commission (AUC) and the African Development Bank (AfDB) in the pro-duction of the African Statistics Yearbook since 2009. Finally, he wished the experts successful deliberations and a pleasant stay in Addis Ababa, and declared the meeting open.

Topics covered during the meeting

The topics that were covered during the EGM included (i) Compendium data sources and methodology; (ii) Compen-dium tables; (iii) Experiences in the area of foreign trade statistics of international organizations, regional economic communities and regional organizations, and countries; (iv) Agenda of the workshop on international merchandise trade statistics planned for 14 to 18 November 2011; and (v) The way forward;

Conclusions and recommendations of the meeting

The conclusions and recommendations of the expert group meeting were mainly focused on data sources and methodol-ogy, compendium tables and on the content of the proposed agenda of the workshop on international merchandise trade statistics planned to be held from 14 to 18 November 2011.

With regard to data sources and methodology the impor-tance of prioritizing data sources was indicated, especially to use country data that are readily available from regional eco-nomic communities (RECs) to whom member states continu-ously send their trade data; to thoroughly review data quality, consistency and coherence by comparing data from various sources; to provide detailed metadata on the data sources used, the estimation methods followed to fill data gaps, the trade system countries use, and the calculation formulas; and to work with partners to set up a regional data dissemination mechanism.

During the production of the Compendium it is required that ACS should take into consideration all the comments provid-ed by the experts on all the tables and come up with a quality publication that satisfies the needs of the users; and indicated that all proposed tables should be retained but there is a need to reorganize the order of the tables to have a smooth flow.

It was indicated by the experts that continuous collaboration and coordination is needed among regional and international organizations in undertaking capacity building activities in African countries.

Concerning the content of the proposed agenda of workshop on international merchandise trade statistics the participants proposed the following topics to be considered in the design-ing of the capacity builddesign-ing program:

• The capacity building program should be more practical with real examples.

• There is a need to assess the problems encountered by countries by administering a short questionnaire. This assessment will also permit to have information on their absorptive capacities;

• The capacity building program should be designed on the basis of the results of the assessment: a demand-driven

AfricAn StAtiSticAl newSletterBulletin d’informAtion StAtiStique AfricAin Introduction

The International Conference Related to Economic Statistics that was organized by the League of Nations in 1928 devoted a significant part of its proceedings to issues related to the comparability of trade statistics. The Conference formulated a number of recommendations on coverage, trade systems, valuation and partner attribution that provided a founda-tion for a better internafounda-tional comparability of country trade data. In 1938, the League of Nations published the report of its Committee of Statistical Experts, entitled Minimum List of Commodities for International Trade Statistics, thereby mak-ing available the first internationally agreed classification of goods for use in international trade statistics.

The United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC) has con-sidered matters relevant to international merchandise trade statistics (IMTS) since its inception and worked to prepare an improved commodity classification such as the Standard International Trade Classification (SITC). The Commission initiated the preparation of a broader set of recommenda-tions in order to improve the comparability of international trade statistics and published International Trade Statistics:

Concepts and Definitions in 1970. To take into account devel-opments in commercial practices as well as methodological developments in other areas of statistics, those recommenda-tions were revised in 1981 and in 1997.

The need for a new revision of the concepts and definitions of IMTS was recognized in recent years by both country and international experts at various regional, supranational and international forums. The new revision of the recommenda-tions for international merchandise trade statistics became necessary, inter alia, in view of changes in the way interna-tional merchandise trade is conducted; changes in user needs and in the legal environment; increasing use of non-customs data sources; changes in related statistical framework; need for additional recommendations on data-compilation strate-gies, quality and metadata, as well as dissemination; and the

need for further clarification of some existing concepts. In consultation with the task force on IMTS, the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) developed a strategy for the revi-sion process and the revised Concepts and Definitions was adopted by UNSC in 2010.

Organization of the Seminar

After the adoption of the revised concepts and definitions of IMTS by the Commission, the first regional workshop in Africa was organized by UNSD in collaboration with its part-ners in November 2010 in Lusaka, Zambia where about 20 countries participated. This Regional Seminar is therefore a follow-up capacity building program for those African coun-tries that were not covered by the first workshop.

The Regional Seminar on IMTS, organized by the African Centre for Statistics (ACS) and the Regional Integration, In-frastructure and Trade Division (RITD) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), was held from 14 to 18 November 2011 at the United Nations Conference Cen-tre (UNCC), Conference Room 5, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

The resource persons to the Regional Seminar were from ECA, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the World Customs Organization (WCO), EU-ROSTAT, and the South African Revenue Services (SARS).

There were nineteen delegates from 14 member States name-ly Angola, Benin, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Guinea-Bissau, Lesotho, Liberia, Mauritania, Si-erra Leone, Somalia, South Sudan, Swaziland and Togo who participated in the Regional Seminar. The participants were from the national statistical offices (NSOs) and customs of-fices of the indicated member States where one of them was a female..

Objectives of the Regional Seminar

The main purpose of the Regional Seminar was to strengthen the capacity of those African countries that seem to be

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Regional Seminar on International Merchandise Trade Statistics, 14 - 18 November 2011, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Negussie Gorfe, ACS

capacity building program;

• There is a need to address the importance of the quality of trade statistics and of the data emerging from custom offices. Moreover, the importance of exports should be stressed during the meeting to make custom officers aware of it:

• It is important to allocate time for country presentations and to invite countries with good practices in order to share knowledge;

• It is necessary to consider the possibility of organizing

a round of workshops as the proposed agenda of the forthcoming workshop is too long and is addressing too many issues;

• On the issue of the presentations of software, there should not be too detailed and should be oriented in the domain of the production of better statistics. These presentations will help to strengthen the collaboration between NSOs and Custom Offices. Special sessions on NSO-Custom offices relationships should be scheduled; and

• Include monitoring and evaluation in the program of the workshop. q

AfriCAn StAtiStiCAl nEwSlEttEr BullEtin d’informAtion StAtiStiquE AfriCAin

tively weak in the area of merchandise trade statistics. Fur-thermore, the specific objectives of the Seminar were to:

• discuss international concepts, definitions and practices on International Merchandise Trade Statistics, and gauge their applicability to African specificities and come up with a concrete action plan for the development and harmonization of IMTS as one of the pillars of the Strategy for Harmonization of Statistics in Africa (SHaSA);

• update the participants on the recently developed recommendations for Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS2012);

• introduce the participants to the software packages of EUROTRACE and ASYCUDA that are used in international trade data collection and compilation;

• share country experiences and apply good practices to overcome barriers;

• sensitize data producers on the importance of merchandise trade data for regional integration;

• discuss the difficulties faced in the compilation of trade statistics including unregistered cross-border trade and smuggled goods, and how to capture them;

• compilation of accurate data on quantities; and

• collection of quality information of exports and imports of goods; and to come up with a detailed action plan for the development and harmonization of IMTS.

Topics Covered in the Seminar

The issues and topics that have been introduced and discussed during the Regional Seminar included the following: (i) Use of international merchandise trade statistics, (ii) The 2010 IMTS, and related methodology and compilers’ practices, (iii) Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS2012); (iv) EUROTRACE software, (v) ASYCUDA soft-ware, and (vi) Completion of self-assessment questionnaire and preparation of follow-up country’s Action Plan,

Conclusions and recommendations of the Seminar

The main conclusions and recommendations that were agreed

upon by the seminar participants included, among others, the following:

• The participants agreed to collect and compile trade statistics on timely basis and provide the different users with quality and relevant trade data including metadata;

• The participating countries have tentatively agreed to adopt the recommendations contained in IMTS 2010:

concepts and definitions;

• The participants were advised to make full use of the national and regional training centers and sessions, as well as the e-learning courses organized by WCO. On the other hand, the participants requested to have capacity building activities on customs procedure codes and other related issues for trade statisticians at NSOs;

• The participants found it necessary to form a task force/working group on international merchandise trade statistics that would involve statisticians, customs officials, and other related stakeholders;

• The countries that have not used EUROTRACE for the compilations of trade statistics were encouraged to install and use the software which is provided free of charge for participating countries. Likewise, countries that do not have computerized customs management system for capturing and managing customs information were encouraged to look into ASYCUDA for possibility of its implementation;

• To the extent possible, the participating countries have prepared Action Plans with regard to the recommendations and encouragements contained in IMTS 2010 by indicating the responsible office(s) and the target date of implementation and agreed to revise

Dans le document African Statistical Newsletter = Bulletin d’Information Statistique 2011 (Page 48-57)