ESS Vision and VALIDATION Item 4.5 of agenda EVUG meeting 2015 Luca Gramaglia, Eurostat (B1)

Current problems in ESS validation No clear picture of who in the ESS is doing what as regards validation Risk of double-work in NSIs and Eurostat or validation gaps Time-consuming validation "ping-pong" Subjective assessment of data quality

Current problems in ESS validation Lack of standards and of a common architecture makes it difficult to create shareable and reuseable IT services within the ESS Duplication of IT development costs within the ESS Manual work due to low integration between the different tools

Medium-term goals for ESS validation Business Outcomes Goal 1: Ensure the transparency of the validation procedures applied to the data sent to Eurostat by the ESS Member States. Increase in the quality and credibility of European statistics   Reduction of costs related to the time-consuming validation cycle in the ESS ("validation Ping-Pong") Goal 2: Enable sharing and re-use of validation services across the ESS on a voluntary basis. Reduction of costs related to IT development and maintenance The table shows the medium-term goals for validation in the ESS. Goal 1 is about the transparency of the validation procedures applied to European statistics. Its scope is limited to the data sent to Eurostat by the Member States. Goal 2 focuses on enabling the sharing of validation tools across the ESS. The scope of Goal 2 is therefore a bit wider, as Goal 2 envisions the possibility that common validation services also be used, strictly on a voluntary basis, for NSI-internal processes. However, it is important to underline that the scope of the current ESS.VIP Validation is limited to providing the methodological and architectural frameworks needed to achieve the medium-term goals, notably through the creation of an ESS methodological handbook and the development, evaluation and piloting of the Validation and Transformation Language. Implementation of the frameworks into production was not in the scope of the project.

ESS.VIP Validation – key focus areas High-level deliverables Developments on five dimensions are needed to provide a complete framework for the implementation of the long-term objectives Dimension High-level deliverables Methodology Common definition, classifications and metrics for validation Standards Standard ESS validation syntax and validation reports IT Common architecture for validation solutions and shareable services HR Communication and training Processes/Governance Common validation policy

ESS.VIP Validation highlights Methodological handbook The methodological handbook is being drafted by the ESSnet. It will contain common definitions, classifications and metrics and will provide a common business language to discuss validation in the ESS. Many parts of the handbook are based on documents developed by Eurostat over the course of 2013-2014 (i.e. classification in terms of validation levels, classification in terms of validation typology, etc…). The methodological handbook would provide the basis for the definition of a template for the description and definition of validation rules by the different subject matter Working Groups.

ESS.VIP Validation highlights VTL A new standard language for validation created by the SDMX community: VTL (Validation and Transformation Language) Version 1.0 came out in March 2015 VTL is a potential standard syntax for validation created by the SDMX Sponsors. The aim of VTL is to provide an unambiguous language to communicate validation rules between different statistical organisations. Through the ESS.VIP Validation Eurostat contributed to the development of VTL 1.0, which was published in March 2015. The ESS.VIP Validation has also conducted a pilot translation of validation rules into VTL in selected domains (i.e. SIMSTAT, Animal Production Statistics, National Accounts coming soon). Through the ESSnet, the ESS.VIP Validation is also conducting a thorough review of VTL to see whether it can meet the criteria for a standard ESS validation language.

ESS.VIP Validation highlights IT developments

Next steps Methodology and Information Standards dimension: Large-scale piloting of the methodological handbook and of the VTL language IT dimension: Definition of the possible interaction scenarios between the IT architecture envisaged by Eurostat and the national IT infrastructure (breakout session) Processes/Governance dimension: Development of common ESS validation policy VTL is a potential standard syntax for validation created by the SDMX Sponsors. The aim of VTL is to provide an unambiguous language to communicate validation rules between different statistical organisations. Through the ESS.VIP Validation Eurostat contributed to the development of VTL 1.0, which was published in March 2015. The ESS.VIP Validation has also conducted a pilot translation of validation rules into VTL in selected domains (i.e. SIMSTAT, Animal Production Statistics, National Accounts coming soon). Through the ESSnet, the ESS.VIP Validation is also conducting a thorough review of VTL to see whether it can meet the criteria for a standard ESS validation language.

Thank you for your attention! Any questions?