Data Gaps By Dr. Grace Bediako Government Statistician Ghana Statistical Service

1. Inter-Regional Workshop on the Production of Gender Statistics NASC Complex New Delhi, India 6-10 August 2007 Data Gaps By Dr. Grace Bediako Government Statistician Ghana Statistical Service

2. Major steps in the gender statistics production process Defining data requirements Statistics required from various fields Defining issues Relevant statistics/indicators Dissemination Problems and questions on gender issues in society Assembling data Statistics to be analysed Data gaps Available statistics Analysis Required improvements in the situation of women and men Determine data sources Presentation Other sources Review quality Dissemination Goals for equal opportunity Assess adequacy of concepts, methods, classifications, etc. Collect new data

3. Fill data gaps Determine data gaps Investigate possible sources Need for improvements in content, concepts, measurement, classifications Generate statistics to be analysed Collect new data

4. Data gaps and deficiencies (1) • Coverage of topics is limited. Data from administrative sources are not regularly compiled and disseminated, national sample surveys are expensive to run and maintain; time series are maintained for only a few surveys. • Comprehensiveness of coverage for data obtained from administrative records, including civil registration, is extremely low in many areas. • Level of geographical disaggregation for many surveys is still at the national and regional/provincial level, whereas there is much interest in programming at subnational/subregional level.

5. The state of vital statistics… Source: United Nations, World’s Women 2005: Progress in Statistics

6. Data gaps and deficiencies (2) • Consistency of concepts and methods: data collection efforts have tended to be governed by different standards; or do not meet the requirements of users (definition and measurement of work). • Timeliness of data: delays in the the release of the results of data collection exercises, or processing of administrative records. • Comparability of different source: when the use of different methods and concepts renders the different data collection results incomparable. • Accessibility to the data a lot of the available data still not accessible to users.

7. Male fertility Unpaid work Time-use School drop-out rates Educational achievement Fields of higher education Access to credit Access to land Informal sector Subsistence agriculture Income control Poverty Individual and household income Violence against women/domestic violence Economic decision-making Decision-making at the local level Decision-making in the household Resource allocation within the household Household composition and structure Diseases and causes of death Internal and international migration Data gap

8. Economic activity • Gap between women’s and men’s pay • 108 of 204 countries or areas report data on total wages • Less than a quarter of countries report data by sex Source: United Nations, World’s Women 2005 Progress in Statistics

9. So what is being done to bridge the gaps…?

10. Thank You