1. Institutional and legal framework of the national statistical system: the national system of official statistics Management seminar on global assessment Yalta, 23.25 September 2009 Session 6 Heinrich Brüngger 6

2. Define the limits of the national statistical system: institutionally Who is within the national statistical system: ◦ NSI ◦ Other recognised producers of official statistics ◦ Statistical Council or Committees with strong representation of users if foreseen in the statistical law (or census law) ◦ Any coordination body between producers of official statistics (whether foreseen in the law itself or only at a lower legal level) ◦ Any subgroup the Statistical Council or Committee may set up ◦ Any project group a producer may set up (normally without explicit legal basis) 2

3. Other recognised producers With the possible exception of the National Bank (not part of government), they should not be listed in the statistical law itself, but only in the statistical programmes Before being included in the statistical programmes, candidates for other producers have to demonstrate and be certified that they are able and willing to produce and disseminate official statistics according to the international standards (fundamental principles/code of practice as well as applicable sectoral standards) 3

4. Other recognised producers (ctd.) It is an important part of the coordination task of the NSI when preparing the statistical programmes to assess whether other producers fulfil or continue to fulfil the prerequisites Recognised producers have to assign their official statistics activities to one organisational sub-unit: only such sub-units are part of the statistical system, not the rest of the organisations (ministries) to which they belong 4

5. Legal consequences of being recognised as producer of official statistics Activities of official statistics as listed in the medium-term or annual programmes can only be assigned to NSI or a recognised producer Confidential data can be exchanged more easily within the statistical system (the statistical law specifies the rules) than flow from an agency within the system to a user outside the system All producers have to strictly observe the fundamental principles, notably confidentiality, impartiality, and the principle of simultaneous access for all users 5

6. Coordination of the national statistical system For both efficiency and credibility considerations, small countries (<30 mio. population) should concentrate as many activities of official statistics as possible in the NSI, and not spread the various scarce skills over too many institutions. This is especially valid for statistical surveys Arrangements should be found (if necessary through a explicit article in the statistical law) that allows the NSI to be partially financed from another governmental agency for selected data collection activities of official statistics for the results of which it is the main user, and if this user agrees that all principles of official statistics should be fully respected 6

7. Coordination (ctd.) The NSI has to be the main coordinator of the system by law, with instruments mentioned in the law, notably the preparation and evaluation of statistical programmes and the setting of standards for the whole system by the chief statistician The statistical infrastructure set up by the NSI should be available for use by other producers. NSI should also be able to give advice on all aspects of official statistics, and build up a basic knowledge also in areas that are in the responsibility of other producers 7

8. Institutional aspects: NSI The NSI is the only government agency whose core task is official statistics In order to be credible in this exclusive focus on statistics, the NSI should not have any responsibility for non-statistical activities (such as the maintenance of administrative registers) Statistical activities outside official statistics can be carried out by the NSI on the basis of transparent rules, cost reimbursement, and clear distinction in the status of the output from the main output (results of official statistics) 8

9. What is official statistics? Activities of official statistics: what is in the statistical programme Results of official statistics: outcome of one or more activity of official statistics that: ◦ Are produced and disseminated with respect of all fundamental principles ◦ Are based on conceptual decisions taken by the international or national community of official statistics (and not imposed by a single user) ◦ Gives a numerical estimation of a publicly relevant mass characteristic that allows comparisons over time and between groups/regions/sectors/countries ◦ Have followed rules of quality control during the whole production process 9

10. What is not a result of official statistics Not all government activities implying number-crunching are official statistics. Examples that are not: ◦ Reporting of administrative units about their activities (they may be an input into official statistics) ◦ Ad hoc tabulation of basic data according to the specifications of one specific user (may become part of the core results in a later period if in line with standard definitions and of interest to the public) ◦ Results generated by researchers with microdata obtained from the NSI ◦ Transformation of results of official statistics according to the needs of a specific user (e.g. for analytical or forecasting purposes) ◦ Use of official statistics in models that include assumptions that cannot be checked periodically against independent empirical data ◦ Opinion polls or ad hoc surveys 10

11. NSI involvement in statistical activities outside official statistics NSI may (within the limits of the law) give access for researchers to microdata generated by activities of official statistics for their own statistical activities NSI may be more involved in such activities by contributing its know-how, if it does not undermine the credibility for official statistics. The responsibility of the NSI must be clearly limited, and the status of the output has to be different In the same way, NSI may cooperate with research organisations Some official statistics have started as research activities, and only be taken over by official statistics once the methodology was proven to be sufficiently robust and accurate 11

12. System-wide responsibility of NSI The NSI is only agency that should have a keen interest in making the national statistical work as one system under common principles; resources have to be devoted to this task The user wants to have results that he/she can trust because it is part of official statistics (quality label); the general user should not have to worry about the division of work within the system The chief statistician bears the ultimate system- wide responsibility for the fitness of use of the released results and the professional adequacy of the underlying processes 12

13. Thank you for your attention Questions and comments are encouraged 13