Highlights of the Statistical capacity development in Africa: Progress report 2019-2020

By Edem KLUDZA

Date: Octobre 2020

The African statistical system has achieved significant improvements in recent years. In spite of that progress, the provision of high-quality statistics in most African countries remains a challenge owing to the vulnerability of national statistical systems, especially in transitional States. The Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and development partners continue to support statistical development in member States to address these challenges.

The report highlighted statistical development initiatives during the period 2019−2020 with a key focus on statistical strategic frameworks, statistical capacity assessment and the governance of national statistical systems.

Initiatives at the continental level

  1. The continental strategy, the second Strategy for the Harmonization of Statistics in Africa, covers the period 2017−2026. The main objective of the Strategy is to harmonize statistics produced in Africa to inform the regional integration agenda, as well as Agenda 2063, the 2030 Agenda, and the five development priority areas of AfDB. Pursuant to the Strategy, the African Union Institute for Statistics has been given the legal mandate to harmonize, produce and validate official statistical data across Africa. Accordingly, the Institute will have the authority to validate and ultimately publish official statistics on African countries. Arrangements have been made by the African Union Commission regarding the operationalization of the Institute. To support the implementation of the Strategy, the mechanisms for coordination and collaboration among ECA, AfDB and the African Union Commission have been revamped for greater synergies in the implementation of statistical programmes.
     
  2. AfDB has coordinated the regional work under the International Comparison Programme for generating purchasing power parities, which are major inputs in the implementation of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area. The purchasing power parities illustrate the comparative performance of all African economies and the differences in price levels among countries.
     
  3. Within the framework of the United Nations reform plan, the United Nations Sustainable Development Group is working to improve the use of data for evidence-based decision-making and to develop strategies to generate and utilize high-quality data for the development of inclusive, sustainable and resilient societies in Africa. In April 2020, the Secretary-General initiated the “Data Strategy for Action by Everyone, Everywhere”. The aim of the Data Strategy is to build an ecosystem across the United Nations that unlocks its full data potential, with a view to improved decision-making and stronger support for people and the planet when it matters most. ECA is customizing this strategic initiative in the context of the African statistical system.
     
  4. AfDB has facilitated data dissemination and storage in the region through its Africa Information Highway initiative. Approved in May 2015 by the Board of Directors of the International Monetary Fund as its main data reporting and dissemination system in Africa, the initiative facilitated the posting by 30 countries of a variety of macroeconomic statistics on their national summary data pages through an open data platform. In addition, using the open data portal created under the initiative, AfDB has developed a dashboard for statistics relating to the COVID-19 pandemic, by which it has disseminated those statistics on a regular basis since June 2020.

 

Statistical capacity assessment

  1. An index of statistical development indicators was endorsed by the Statistical Commission for Africa at its fifth meeting, in December 2016, with the aim of promoting ownership and enhancing the sustainability of the statistical development process in Africa. Moreover, it will provide a model for measuring statistical development that can be emulated by other developing countries outside the African continent. The Statistical Commission for Africa has requested pan-African organizations and countries to put in place institutional mechanisms at the continental level to support the implementation of the index.
  2. The AfDB provided technical and financial support to 52 countries in the region to annually report on their Agricultural Statistics Capacity Indicators for the years 2017 and 2018. In addition, an assessment was conducted in all English speaking countries in the level of development of the Statistics Business Registers (SBRs). The assessment report was completed in 2020.

Statistical and leadership trainings

  1. Under the overall umbrella of the African Group on Statistical Training and Human Resources, ECA, as the secretariat of the Group, continues to seek partners in enhancing the skills of African experts.
     
  2. ECA is pursuing a partnership with the Centre for Development Data, a World Bank hub based in Rome, to facilitate the production of high-quality, timely and relevant microdata for evidence-based policymaking and investment decisions to achieve poverty reduction, food security and growth.
     
  3. ECA is currently working with the Office for National Statistics of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland on an exciting statistical leadership programme for African statistical systems. The programme aims to establish and deliver statistical leadership training to equip senior leaders of national statistical offices in Africa with the skills required to lead their organizations on a programme of statistical modernization.
     
  4. The African Group on Statistical Training and Human Resources is engaged in close collaboration with the African Institute for Economic Development and Planning to develop online courses in various subjects that will provide leadership training using the expertise of the Institute.

The African Group on Transformation and Modernization of Official Statistics

  1. ECA proposed to establish a working group that would guide the transformation and modernization of official statistics in Africa along with technical teams to be known as “transformation and modernization teams”.

 

The mission of the African group on transformation and modernization of official statistics would be to direct, oversee and approve the development of frameworks, guidelines, methods and standards to support the transformation and modernization of official statistics in Africa. The group would create, direct and oversee the work of the transformation and modernization teams that would work on specific subjects. The group would report to the Statistical Commission for Africa. It would be composed of ten Directors General of national statistical offices in such a way that two countries would represent each ECA subregion.