1. 1 Modernization of Statistical Production and Services in Asia-Pacific Marko Javorsek, Statistics Division, ESCAP International Seminar on Modernizing Official Statistics: Meeting Productivity and New Data Challenges 24 - 26 October 2013, Tianjin, PR China

2. ESCAP events in modernization  Side event to the Committee on Statistics, Second session – Modernizing statistical information systems, Bangkok 2010  Expert Group Meeting: Opportunities and advantages of enhanced collaboration on statistical information management in Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok 2011  SIAP Management Seminar 2011 – Shifting from “stove-pipe” data producer to “information service” provider  Practical advisory workshop: Supporting effective use of information and communication technology in population census operations, Moscow 2012 –GSBPM & SDMX  Expert group meeting: MSIS, Bangkok/Paris 2013

3. What are the main drivers of modernization?  Creation of a more adaptive and cost-effective information management environment through stronger collaboration –Processes that are more agile and quality assured, while requiring less resources to operate and maintain  Modernize information systems to address the evolving field of statistics and maintain relevance across developed and developing countries  Regional collaboration and influence global directions –Collaborative efforts are likely to be more cost-effective and of higher quality

4. Specificities of Asia-Pacific region in the field of modernisation  Cost-effectiveness benefit was assessed to be of less immediate priority  Improved quality could be taken up as a key objective  Concepts, standards and tools are relatively new to a large number of countries in the region  NSOs in the region are most often structured by statistical areas or domains  No transnational legislation on statistics  The least developed countries lack the full range of methodological and information technology expertise

5. Regional perspective on modernization  CST 3 (2012) proposes the establishment of –High-level strategic body –Network of Experts  Strategic Advisory Body for the Modernization of Statistical Production and Services in Asia and the Pacific (SAB-AP) –The mission is “To raise awareness and build capacity, particularly related to concepts, methods and standards, to support national modernization efforts”  The Body has 7 members (Australia, India, Malaysia, Pakistan, Rep. of Korea, Samoa, Viet Nam) and is chaired by Australia  First meeting of the body in November 2013 in Japan (next month)

6. MSIS 2013  In 2013 ESCAP joins the organization and MSIS; first time in Asia-Pacific in 2010 in the Republic of Korea  23-25 April 2013 held in 2 venues joined by live web link –Paris – hosted by OECD –Bangkok – hosted by ESCAP  Joint sessions were held Bangkok afternoon and Paris morning time  The meeting discussed the following substantive themes: –Architecture; –Streamlining statistical production; –Innovation; –Collaboration.

7. Outcomes of the MSIS 2013 (Bangkok)  Participants recommended that –the work of the expert community centre around key priority areas, –interested practitioners and experts to gather in smaller working groups.  Key priority areas: –Strengthening national statistical systems (coordination, information flow in decentralized systems, etc.) –Generic Standard Business Process Model (GSBPM) –Statistical Data and Metadata Exchange (SDMX) –e-collection –Data dissemination –Big data

8. Figure 1: Schematic depiction of the HLG, SAB-AP and working groups

9. MSIS 2014  14-16 April 2014 held in 2 locations simultaneously: –Dublin, Ireland hosted by the Central Statistics Office of Ireland –Bangkok (TBC) hosted by ESCAP  Preparations on-going, call for papers will be sent out soon  The meeting schedule is centered around the following substantive themes: –How IT can contribute to changing organizational culture; –Standards-based modernization; –Innovation; –Architecture.

10. ADB/ESCAP Project on SDMX  Direct outcome from the MSIS 2013 EGM  Working group (WG-SDMX) will be established under the auspices of the SAB-AP  The primary focus of the project will be to promote the use of SDMX among national statistical systems in the region and build regional capacities in applying it  The project will focus on –Mapping of DSD for data exchange (reuse global DSD), –Capacity building on using tools to support automated data exchange (e.g. Eurostat SDMX-RI).

11. ADB/ESCAP Project on SDMX (cont’d)  Focus on economic statistics indicators (ADB Key Indicators), most likely limited to NA or BoP in the first stage  Take into account the specific needs of other international organizations collecting economic data (e.g. OECD, IMF, UNSD, WB, etc.)  In the pilot phase focus on 4 to 5 countries in Asia-Pacific  Timeline: –Scoping phase: November 2013 – February 2014 –Implementation phase: March – December 2014

12. Thank you!