STC - Statistics Accessibility and Presentation Group (STAP) Communication of Statistics Joint ECB NBRM Seminar on Statistics Skopje, 4 October 2013 ECB-RESTRICTED FINAL

Rubric © Outline – STAP Communication of Statistics * The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the ECB User feed-back and what do they want Who are using our statistics The importance of communicating statistics ECB-RESTRICTED FINAL 4Challenges ahead

Rubric © The importance of communicating statistics Good sustainable decisions FACTUAL AND INDEPENDENT STATISTICS Analysis & assessment Policy options Policy decisions Policy validations Analysis & assessment Statistical and financial literacy C OMMUNICATION Professional users and citizensPolicy-making Knowledge-based society Policy accountability The communication of statistics contributes to building public support for and trust in the pursuit of price and financial stability and prudent economic policies. Source: Nymand-Andersen, P. (2013), “Communicating central banking statistics: Making useful sense of statistics in a dynamic world”, Journal of the International Association for Official Statistics, IOS Press, forthcoming

Rubric © The importance of communicating statistics The added value of communicating central banking statistics 1 Supporting sustainable and sound policies 2 Assisting the acceptance process of policy decisions 3 Enhancing the effectiveness of monetary policy 4 Facilitating the functioning of financial markets 5 Building trust in central banking and contributing to positive reputation 6 Contributing to the responsibility of independent institutions in being transparent and accountable for decisions 7 Enriching the analytical contribution and enhances the political debate 8 Fostering a knowledge-based society 9 Enhancing statistics and financial literacy 10 Increasing welfare in society Source: Nymand-Andersen, P. (2013), Communicating facts and figures in times of financial crisis: a European perspective, Special edition of the Statistical Journal of the IAOS to celebrate the 2012 IAOS Conference, IOS Press, forthcoming

Rubric © Who are using our statistics Based on 5 tailor-made user surveys:  Interview with ECB journalists  ECB website users  International ESCB/IO statisticians  Large data users/vendors  European banks/European Banking Federation (EBF) More than 300 suggestions for improving the accessibility and usability of ESCB statistics also… Significant barriers for accessing statistics

Rubric © Request for Statistics Core users of Statistics Governing Council/ Executive Board Journalists/Media Financial analysts Reporting institutions High volume data users General public Research/Academia  Serving the core professional market segment will amplify the statistics message and reach a significant broader audiences, including the general public Who are using our statistics

Rubric © User feed-back and what do they want From the pool of research  62 recommendations are put forward as the most valuable and fit for central banking  The recommendations are already standard practice and are applied with success by other NCBs, OECD, FED, Eurostat and NSIs The 62 recommendations were clustered into  Nine self-contained “Islands of Excellence” – (IoE)

Rubric © Island of Excellence (# of recommendations in brackets) Examples of user recommendations Media /Journalists (8)  Workshop, training, webinars  Using descriptive statistics in press releases  Adding deep links to series in press releases  Communicate in common terminology Financial analysts (7)  Easy to select country comparison  Ability to select charts, graphs and associated statistics directly from publications Research /Academia(4)  Promoting research based on central bank’s statistics  Availability of micro data High volume users (3)  Facilitate the re-distribution of statistics  Easy to use download facilities Reporting institutions (3)  Provide reporting agents with monthly comparable statistics (national & other national) User feed-back and what do they want

Rubric © Island of Excellence (# of recommendations in brackets) Examples of user recommendations Mobile statistics (2)  E-book formats  User required and user friendly statistics applications for mobile devices Visualisation (2)  Explore common off-the-shelf visualisation tools fit for statistics use  Competition on use of visualisation of statistics Website (24)  Sharing of chart gallery  One shop for euro area and associated national statistics User interaction (9)  Website monitoring  User surveys and needs  Online call centre  Use of video to present statistics User feed-back and what do they want

Rubric © ESCB coordination needed By any NCB with no or insignificant technical work With interaction of other business areas Together with identified sparing partners With close involvement and feed-back from WGSIM With a ESCB policy concept by the STC web-statistics sharing of findings user needs use of video press briefings press releases the use of webinars EBF, statistics to reporters data vendors technical feasibilities technical standards friendly downloads mobile applications release policy one stat shop Challenge of communicating statistics

Rubric © Challenge of communicating statistics Extract wisdom from statistics, what is the statistical message, guide the users in using quality statistics Users can not be expected to understand statistics language and the impact of different statistics methods Combine text, statistics, tables and graphs for easy reuse Boost the use of visualisations and graphics Tailor internet portal for core professional users based on economic concepts and an user centric approach

Rubric © Challenge of communicating statistics  The STC created a “Statistics Accessibility and Presentation Group”  Think tank for proposals for “making ESCB statistics more accessible”  Propose communication strategy and prioritised implementation proposals to the in a phased approach  The STC working groups play a central and important role in the implementation process STC forthcoming proposal for  a policy for accessing euro area and national statistics  fostering cooperation and information-sharing and transparency in methodology  serving reporting agents with meaningful statistics