Asian Development Bank Statistical Capacity Building 21 July 2008

1. Asian Development BankStatistical Capacity Building21 July 2008

2. Outline • Introduction • Need for statistical capacity building • Shortfalls • Revised strategy for sustainability • Sustainability of SCB in recipient countries • Inter agency collaboration

3. Introduction • ADB has history of technical assistance (TA) in statistical capacity building (SCB) since 1974 • Only development agency in region with a SCB TA program • Assist in SCB activities through country specific TA programs or regional technical assistance (RETA) programs • Country specific TA (21 developing member countries have benefited) • Regional technical TA (all 44 developing member countries have benefited)

4. Within ADB, the Economics and Research Dept. has been the prime mover of statistical capacity building • Areas of SCB focused on: • developing skills on national accounts, price statistics, services sector statistics, poverty statistics, developing statistical plans, statistics act etc • resource transfer to underwrite statistical operation (surveys – household and establishment) • procurement of equipment • Significant strides have been made, but need for SCB TA still remains

5. Conceptual Implementation of 1993 SNA 1 Include Western Europe, Northern America, Japan, Australia, New Zealand 2 Include all Member States of ESCAP, excluding France, the Netherlands, the U.K., and the U.S.A. Source: Information provided by UNSD, August 2006. NB: Conceptual implementation: inclusion of items affecting levels of GDP

6. Scope of Accounts (Minimum Requirement) 1Include Western Europe, Northern America, Japan, Australia, New Zealand 2 Include all Member States of ESCAP, excluding France, the Netherlands, the U.K., and the U.S.A. Source: Information provided by UNSD, August 2006. NB: Scope of implementation: measured by minimum dataset comprising 7 recommended tables

7. Need for SCB assistance • Strengthen national statistical system: • Generate timely, reliable and quality statistics for efficient administration, management and evidence-based policy making • Ability to collect primary data • Generate internationally comparable statistics • Assisting countries with weak statistical systems to build statistical infrastructure

8. Shortfalls • Gap filling: • substantial funding shortfall in NSO • satisfy an immediate demand of key users • Based on ad hoc requests by countries • SCB done on a piecemeal basis - devoid of any sustainability • Did not involve a systematic assessment of needs and relevance from: • standpoint of client county’s medium and long term statistical development strategy • in context of ADB’s own priority goals for statistical development in the region

9. Revised strategy for sustainability • 1. Systematic – conduct diagnostic studies with direct country involvement • Examine statistical strength and weaknesses • Identify obstacles and positive factors for the development of statistics • Access availability of budgets for: • Statistical development • Human resources • Information technology • Field operation (surveys)

10. 2. Long-term SCB programs drawn factoring in • Institutional environment • Availability of statistical legislative framework • Management and organization of statistical system • Level of budgetary resources for statistical activities • Reflect national priorities • Stakeholder consultations – NSOs; line ministries • 3. SCB to be results oriented • Clear and measurable targets – Design and monitoring framework drawn up with clearly stated outcomes and outputs

11. Appropriate conditionalities included • Country consent • Memorandum of Agreement - to promote and ensure government ownership and buy-in • Milestonesto achieve outputs are set • Workshops to present results and assess results • Release of funds upon satisfactory attainment of predetermined and agreed milestones • 4. Integrate SCB programs into the Country Partnership Strategy (CPS) for long-term commitment • 5. Promoting use administrative data sources • Improve administrative data (AD) sources • Country assessment studies of AD system • Manual on Use of AD sources

12. Sustainability of SCB in recipient country • Improved legal framework (statistics act) – NSOs mandated as primary source of official statistics • Statistical master plan (or a national statistics development strategy) with buy-in from government/Central Bank • programmed/structured implementation of statistical activities • set priorities based on budget allocation • secure government commitment to invest in SCB

13. NSOs must remain relevant - conduct regular dialogue with users • produce timely, reliable and relevant statistics • understand priorities of users and developments in the economic world • ability to respond in a timely manner • Human resource issues • In developing countries staff costs typically represent more than 75% of budget (Source: WB) • Chronic budgetary shortfall for routine statistical activities • High staff turnover undermine the effectiveness of training • Need to develop skills and keep up with technical developments • Limited supply of skills • Limited flexibilities • Small staff size • Limited training opportunities

14. Inter agency collaboration in SCB • Training • Organizing training seminars and workshops • make it relevant to regional circumstances • immediate relevance to countries in the region • Targeted technical assistance, advisory missions and consultancies • Advocacy workshops on need for statistics for policy making

15. Technical cooperation • The 2005 ICP modal Governance structure premised on • Regional coordinating agencies working closely with beneficiary countries at regional level • World Bank working with regional coordinating agencies at global level • The IMF-WB modal in Anglophone Africa Formal separation of responsibilities • the IMF covers macroeconomic and financial statistics • World Bank covers socio-demographic statistics

16. Thank you