Principles Governing International Statistical Activites
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Bearing in mind that statistics are essential for
sustainable economic, environmental and social development and that public
trust in official statistics is anchored in professional independence and
impartiality of statisticians, their use of scientific and transparent methods
and equal access for all to official statistical information, the Chief
Statisticians or coordinators of statistical activities of United Nations
agencies and related organizations, agree that implementation of the following
principles will enhance the functioning of the international statistical
system.
In doing so, they note the endorsement of these
principles by the Committee for the Coordination of Statistical Activities on
14 September, 2005; they further recall the adoption by the United Nations
Statistical Commission of the Fundamental Principles of Official
Statistics in its Special Session of 11-15 April 1994, and the endorsement
of the Declaration of Good Practices in Technical Cooperation in Statistics
in its 30th Session of 1-5 March 1999.
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1) |
High quality international
statistics, accessible for all, are a fundamental element of global
information systems |
Good practices include:
- Having regular
consultations with key users both inside and outside the relevant
organisation to ascertain that their needs are met
- Periodic review of
statistical programmes to ensure their relevance
- Compiling and disseminating
international statistics based on impartiality
- Providing equal access to
statistics for all users
- Ensuring free public
accessibility of key statistics
|
2) |
To maintain the trust in
international statistics, their production is to be impartial and strictly
based on the highest professional standards |
Good practices include:
- Using strictly professional
considerations for decisions on methodology, terminology and data
presentation
- Developing and using
professional codes of conduct
- Making a clear distinction,
in statistical publications, between statistical and analytical comments
on the one hand and policy-prescriptive and advocacy comments on the other
|
3) |
The public has a right to be
informed about the mandates for the statistical work of the organisations |
Good practices include:
- Making decisions about
statistical work programmes publicly available
- Making documents for and
reports of statistical meetings publicly available
|
4) |
Concepts, definitions,
classifications, sources, methods and procedures employed in the production
of international statistics are chosen to meet professional scientific
standards and are made transparent for the users |
Good practices include:
- Aiming continuously to
introduce methodological improvements and systems to manage and improve
the quality and transparency of statistics
- Enhancing the professional
level of staff by encouraging them to attend training courses, to do
analytical work, to publish scientific papers and to participate in
seminars and conferences.
- Documenting the concepts,
definitions and classifications, as well as data collection and processing
procedures used and the quality assessments carried out and making this
information publicly accessible
- Documenting how data are
collected, processed and disseminated, including information about editing
mechanisms applied to country data
- Giving credit, in the
dissemination of international statistics, to the original source and
using agreed quotation standards when re-using statistics originally
collected by others
- Making officially agreed
standards publicly available
|
5) |
Sources and methods for data
collection are appropriately chosen to ensure timeliness and other aspects of
quality, to be cost-efficient and to minimise the reporting burden for data
providers |
Good practices include:
- Facilitating the provision
of data by countries
- Working systematically on
the improvement of the timeliness of international statistics
- Periodic review of
statistical programmes to minimise the burden on data providers
- Sharing collected data with
other organisations and collecting data jointly where appropriate
- Contributing to an
integrated presentation of statistical programmes, including data
collection plans, thereby making gaps or overlaps clearly visible
- Ensuring that national
statistical offices and other national organisations for official
statistics are duly involved and advocating that the Fundamental
Principles of Official Statistics are applied when data are collected in
countries
|
6) |
Individual data collected about
natural persons and legal entities, or about small aggregates that are
subject to national confidentiality rules, are to be kept strictly
confidential and are to be used exclusively for statistical purposes or for
purposes mandated by legislation |
Good practices include:
- Putting measures in place
to prevent the direct or indirect disclosure of data on persons,
households, businesses and other individual respondents
- Developing a framework
describing methods and procedures to provide sets of anonymous micro-data
for further analysis by bona fide researchers, maintaining the
requirements of confidentiality
|
7) |
Erroneous interpretation and misuse
of statistics are to be immediately appropriately addressed |
Good practices include:
- Responding to perceived
erroneous interpretation and misuse of statistics
- Enhancing the use of
statistics by developing educational material for important user groups
|
8) |
Standards for national and
international statistics are to be developed on the basis of sound
professional criteria, while also meeting the test of practical utility and
feasibility |
Good practices include:
- Systematically involving
national statistical offices and other national organisations for official
statistics in the development of international statistical programmes,
including the development and promulgation of methods, standards and good
practices
- Ensuring that decisions on
such standards are free from conflicts of interest, and are perceived to
be so
- Advising countries on
implementation issues concerning international standards
- Monitoring the
implementation of agreed standards
|
9) |
Coordination of international
statistical programmes is essential to strengthen the quality, coherence and
governance of international statistics, and avoiding duplication of work |
Good practices include:
- Designating one or more
statistical units to implement statistical programmes, including one unit
that coordinates the statistical work of the organisation and represents
the organisation in international statistical meetings
- Participating in
international statistical meetings and bilateral and multilateral
consultations whenever necessary
- Working systematically
towards agreements about common concepts, classifications, standards and
methods
- Working systematically
towards agreement on which series to consider as authoritative for each
important set of statistics
- Coordinating technical
cooperation activities with countries between donors and between different
organisations in the national statistical system to avoid duplication of
effort and to encourage complementarities and synergy
|
10) |
Bilateral and multilateral
cooperation in statistics contribute to the professional growth of the
statisticians involved and to the improvement of statistics in the
organisations and in countries |
Good practices include:
- Cooperating and sharing
knowledge among international organisations and with countries and regions
to further develop national and regional statistical systems
- Basing cooperation projects
on user requirements, promoting full participation of the main
stakeholders, taking account of local circumstances and stage of
statistical development
- Empowering recipient
national statistical systems and governments to take the lead
- Advocating the
implementation of the Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics in
countries
- Setting cooperation projects
within a balanced overall strategic framework for national development of
official statistics
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