International Statistics Amanda Wakaruk WISLL, February 18, 2010

Why is this so hard?

Outline Mini-history of comparative international statistics  Key Resources and Exercises: WDI, UNData SESSION GOAL reduce anxiety = know where to start  understand who compiles what

Dr. Hans Rosling = no fear TED-talk: Let my dataset change your mindset  US State Department, 2009 

Mini-History: 18 th century 18 th century: first reliable national censuses  1790: United States  1792: Sweden  1795: Holland  1797: Norway and Denmark  1801: England  1802: France (earlier censuses relatively incomplete)

Mini-History: 19 th century 1800: France creates a Statistical Bureau, starts tabulating everything 1853: 1st Statistical Congress in Brussels “for the purpose of introducing unity into the statistical documents of all countries” (McCaffrey, 2009) 1887: 1st meeting of the International Statistical Society in Rome

Mini-History: 20 th century : WWI : League of Nations (LON)  Conference on International Co ‐ Operation in Statistics (1919)  International Conference on Economic Statistics (1928)  International Labour Organization (ILO) and Health Organization (later WHO) established under the LON umbrella  LON Yearbook : WWII

Mini-History: 20 th century : WWII 1942: 1 st United Nations Declaration 1944: Dumbarton Oaks and Bretton Woods Conferences… GATT/WTO, IMF, WB/IBRD  World Trade Organization (WTO)  International Monetary Fund (IMF)  World Bank

Mini-History: 20 th century 1946: first meeting of the UN Statistical Office  first comprehensive comparative per capita income figures  first comparable index numbers for industrial production  first method for comparing production figures from communist and capitalist countries 1947: World Statistical Congress (Washington), UN Statistical Commission established 1953: System of National Accounts (SNA)  “one of the greatest social science research advances in this century and the foundation for most modern economic development” (Farber, 1972, p. 11) 1965: United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)  Human Development Report and Human Development Index (1990-)

Mini-History: 20 th century Statistics: created by people, for people “At the national level, the compartmentalization among producers of statistics persists. The result is a weakened national data collection and dissemination capability. There are examples of successful networking between a statistical office and other government departments, but the degree of collaboration tends to be a function of the personalities of the heads of departments rather than of process. Proof of this is evident when there is a change of headship of a statistical office. The relationship of other departments to the statistical office does not continue as a matter of course, but has to be renegotiated, sometimes with negative effects. The political environment in the Caribbean as it relates to data can be described as generally one of disinterest.” Busby (1994), p. 404

Mini-History: 21 th century 2002: Inter ‐ Agency Committee for the Coordination of Statistical Activities  includes representatives from OECD, EU, WTO  reports to the Statistical Commission Statistics as a Public Good  objectives are to provide free access to global statistics, to educate users about the importance of statistics for evidence-based policy and decision-making and to assist National Statistical Offices to strengthen their data dissemination capabilities  UNData statistical databases AND tables “UNdata is used as the primary data source by thematicmapping.org and Google Earth.”

Web Sites to Remember United Nations Statistical Division (UNSD)  Specialized Agencies  International Labour Organization (ILO)  World Health Organization (WHO)  Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)  World Tourism Organization (“other WTO”) Other UN Orgs  UNESCO  UNIFEM

Other Resources of Note Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)  (“statistics” link on left) Eurostat and EU Bookshop   National Statistical Agencies   Statistical Abstract of the US Google Search (& Scholar): public data statistics Periodical Indexes and Databases (e.g., AccessUN, CIAO, PAIS, Expanded Academic/Academic OneFile, CBCA, etc.) Mitchell, B.R. (2003). International Historical Statistics, th edition. 3 vols. New York: Palgrave.

statistics: created by people, for people “Each year since 1988, Chinese officials have reported a steady rise in the number of fish caught off China’s shores, even as fish stocks almost everywhere else have declined... China’s rising catch has outstripped the combined decline of every other country in the world, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations... it turns out, China’s numbers were too good to be true... the inflated numbers seem to have been spawned by antiquated communist data-collection methods... local officials passed inflated numbers to Beijing officials, who simply added them up without validating them, and sent them along to the United Nations.” Piore & Mooney (2002), p. 46.

statistics: created by people, for people “There are decent data for just a handful of indicators, such as child mortality, but for most of the 163 developing countries, many indicators do not even have two data points for the period Significant efforts are now being made to improve data collection. Meanwhile, UN agencies fill in the missing data points using ‘modeling.’” Millennium (2007), p “Data gaps have been clearly identified, and efforts to assist countries in the production and use of the necessary data have been scaled up. Statisticians from UN member countries have also reviewed the quality and availability of data to monitor the goals and have provided recommendations. At the 2006 and 2007 meetings of the UN Statistical Commission, a forum for the heads of national statistical systems, more than 130 countries reported on their progress in implementing these recommendations. Although noting that deficiencies still exist, the commission agreed that real progress has been made, and called for improved funding and political commitment to support the development of statistics. We believe the national and global statistical systems have benefited immensely from these efforts. The global statistical system has made a huge effort to improve data quality and availability, from helping to conduct censuses and surveys in difficult areas to improving vital registration systems. This has produced visible results.” Cheung (2007), p. 974.

statistics: created by people, for people “ ‘Canada’s overall crime rate is now 50 percent higher than the crime rate in the United States’, wrote David Frum.... he had compared data from the US Bureau of Justice Statistics and Statistics Canada... That may sound like a reasonable thing to do, but it’s not... there are only two ways it can be done... you can carefully analyse the definitions and methods used to generate data to ensure you compare only apples to apples... the other method is to conduct a survey in multiple countries... the United Nations International Crime Victim Surveys (ICVS) are the gold standard.” Gardner (2006), p. A13

Where to get help: INTL-doc  UofT ischool International Organizations Course Page Your WISLL friends!

Works Cited Busby, L. A. (1994). Statistical data dissemination: The experience of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. Journal of Government Information, 21(5), Cheung, P. (2007, April 26). Millennium: big effort has produced statistical results. Nature, 446(7139), 974. Farber, M. A. (1972, November 4). U.N. statistical office a growing success. New York Times, p. 11. Gardner, D. (2006, February 15). Crime story depends on the teller. The Ottawa Citizen, p. A13. Millennium. (2007, March 22). Millennium development holes. Nature, 446(7134), 347. Piore, A. & Mooney, P. (2002, January 21). China’s statistics are fishier than its oceans; why the PRC overcounts its annual catch. Newsweek, 46.