Chair: Monika Bieniek
Room: S4B Lajkonik
Time: 13:15 - 14:00
Date: 27 June
Speed Talk Session 5 - papers & presentations
| Presenting Author | Abstract |
|---|---|
| Ed Humpherson e-mail: ed.humpherson@statistics.gov.uk | Title: <<< Statistics regulation for an age of “post-truth”: The UK’s new Office for Statistics Regulation >>> The last 18 months have seen significant shifts in the UK’s institutional environment, resulting from the Bean Review of Economic Statistics; the increased scrutiny placed on statistics in a shifting political context; and a broader society-level concern about a “post-truth” era. Into this environment, the UK Statistics Authority launched a new regulator – the Office for Statistics Regulation – in November 2016. This new body stands up for statistics in public; takes a whole-system view of statistics in areas like health, migration and crime; and raises the quality of individual statistical outputs. In this presentation, Ed Humpherson, the head of the Office for Statistics Regulation, will explain the vision for a public champion of statistics – to celebrate when statistics serve the public good and challenge publicly when they do not. He will explain what the Office for Statistics Regulation is doing to drive up trustworthiness, quality and value of whole systems of statistics; and how it has intervened publicly in high profile uses of statistics, including crime data, migration and the UK’s contribution to the European Union. It’s a story of organizational development; of reimagining statistics for a data-rich world; and of why statistical producers should have nothing to fear from the term “post truth”. |
| Nili Karsai e-mail: nili@cbs.gov.il | Title: <<< Statistics storytelling- A magical mirror: Israelis, Palestinians, Jordanians and Egyptians cooperate in order to improve their official Foreign Trade Statistics by using "Mirror Exercises" >>> Official foreign trade statisticians deal with asymmetry problems in bilateral trade statistics. In an ideal situation, country A's data on exports to country B should be equal to country B's data on imports from country A. In real life there are discrepancies which create confusion among users of trade statistics. Such discrepancies should be reduced as much as possible since accurate and comparable trade statistics helps decision makers and facilitate actual trade. "Mirror Exercises" are a quality methodological tool used to identify reasons of such discrepancies and conduct reconciliations in order to explain and reduce asymmetries. The article reviews some basic concepts of official foreign trade in goods statistics needed to understand the subject. The issue is explained by a case example: Mirror exercises on Israeli, Palestinian, Jordanian and Egyptian official bilateral trade in goods statistics. The exercises were organized and supported by the European Union (EU) Euro-Mediterranean Statistical Cooperation Project (MEDSTAT). The main reasons for the discrepancies found in these mirror exercises were: The use of different trade systems, diverse data sources, misclassifications, data recording issues and errors. Quality improvements achieved in the exercises were as follows, better implementation of international standards, improved coverage and greater harmonization of trade in goods statistics. Results of these exercises could be seen especially at fuel products data, where a major asymmetry was solved by analyzing data from trade documentation and sources. As a general advice, users of bilateral trade data are encouraged to check both countries official data. The paper was written in a user-friendly "Statistics Storytelling" style, as recommended by the United Nations (UN) guide for increasing literacy of official statistics among users. This aim is in accordance with the European Statistical System (ESS) vision to address user needs. |
| Gürdal Gedik e-mail: gurdal.gedik@tuik.gov.tr | Title: <<< Quality quest in official statistics through international cooperation: Turkish Statistical Institute Experience >>> Quality is one of the most important phenomena in every field of our lives in this age. Since information and knowledge are fundamental pillars for modern societies and official statistics provide an information infrastructure for the needs of various categories of users, enhancing the quality of official statistics is of utmost importance in this frame as well. Accordingly, National Statistical Institutes (NSIs) have been intensively working to improve both the quality of their systems and products through various ways. However, high quality statistical information is neither easy nor cheap. NSIs need to build sound infrastructures and invest in the production of high quality statistics in order to do so. Budgetary constraints in the public sector have led to shrinking resources also for statistical administrations. These issues cause considerable challenges for official statistics. International cooperation in the field of statistics offers an important contribution to overcome these difficulties. In line with this perspective, the principle on coordination and cooperation was very recently included in the European Statistics Code of Practise as "Principle 0". Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) has also been an active actor in the field of statistical cooperation. Having a long history in statistics and gained significant experience through European Union harmonisation process, TurkStat shares her knowledge with other NSIs in order to contribute to their quality of human resources as well as quality standards of official statistics, in a demand driven manner. This paper presents the international cooperation frameworks and practical implementations of TurkStat in the field of statistics. It explains how TurkStat supports the capacity building efforts in human resources and accordingly how it contributes to the improvement of the quality of statistical production in certain NSIs. |
| Patrizio Di Nicola e-mail: dinicola@istat.it | Title: <<< E-learning platform and innovative teaching methods in ISTAT >>> In the last years Istat invested in experimentation of innovative teaching methods and tools, aiming at building up learning environments based on the integration of “traditional” tools with Technology Enhanced Learning resources. Within this context, an e-learning platform was set up in order to promote the statistical culture and innovative teaching methods and to develop and enhance statistical skills. E-learning and blended-learning courses are characterized by an innovative instructional design. Videotutorials, videolessons, webinars are some of new teaching formats tested recently to enrich our training programs. These new innovative teaching methods and tools: support Istat modernization, promoting and facilitating the change; favor the statistics dissemination expecially in the National statistical system; improve training to the data collectors, allocated to all the Italian territory. E-learning methods are clearly connected with the competence system and the projects involved in it as 360 feedback, survey on occupation, etc. The paper will describe the e-learning platform focusing on the main methods and tools used in Istat. Paper will analyze also main advantages and critical issues of these new training methods. |
| Patrizio Di Nicola e-mail: dinicola@istat.it | Title: <<< Setting up a competence system at Istat >>> Last year, the Italian Institute of Statistics implemented a new statistical production system and, accordingly, a new organizational model. Within the framework of this modernization process, new roles and new competences are required to achieve the Institute’s goals. The development of human resources has to go along with the modernization of the statistical production and play an active role in corporate strategy and planning. To support this change, the Istat Human Resources Department is engaged in the definition of a competence system. This will help to better manage the human capital, foster competence development and create an organized source of information to support HR policies on recruiting, mobility, training planning, career development, etc. Istat competence system will be based on information gathered by means of various initiatives such as: survey on occupations - identification of the occupations carried out by staff; development of a technical competence data base – mapping of the knowledge and the technical skills possessed by staff and their level; survey on organizational skills – identification of the organizational competences used in working processes; identification of the expected competences – identification of the competences required in the working processes and measurement of gaps. The paper will describe the achievements and way forward to build a competence system and focus on strong and weak points. |
| Maria Giovanna Piras e-mail: piras@istat.it | Title: <<< Revision Policy and Revision Analysis in Short Term Statistics in Istat: Recent Developments in Standardization and Communication Innovations >>> During the last two years the Italian National Institute of Statistics has deeply worked in finding out and establishing a common framework in revision policy and revision analysis in the short term statistics domain. The objective was the setting of an extensively shared tool for internal quality governance and the building of an easily accessible platform where information on practice and measure of revisions can be drawn by stakeholders. At this aim, a mandate was given to a transversal working group whose members were chosen from different structures of the Italian NSI: methodologists, statisticians, experts in IT and in communication, quality managers. Main result of this work, the setting of a dedicated section of Istat website where, beside the presentation of the established protocol on policy, analysis and dissemination of revisions, different tools and related measures of revisions based on “revision triangles” are provided. At the moment this new environment has completely been settled for three short terms production lines: Monthly Industrial Production, Quarterly National Accounts, Quarterly Labour Costs statistics. In the next future, it will be extended to cover all the short term themes, implying the overcoming of heterogeneous and extremely fragmented practices, towards the improvement of a wider transparency and accountability of the produced statistics. The purpose of this paper is threefold: presenting the main established protocol on revision policy, analysis and dissemination of revisions of published statistics; describing main input/output of a generalized tool for storing indicators and calculating revision indicators; identifying communication tools (calendar of revisions, release of vintage series, dissemination of the revision triangles, etc.). |
| Catherine Bremner e-mail: catherine.bremner@ons.gov.uk | Title: <<< Engaging with users to improve quality >>> ‘Quality is everyone’s responsibility.’ Do you review processes to ensure the best quality data is produced? Regardless of the topic, speaking to our users to improve the quality of a process or output is an important step. There is a requirement under the UK Code of Practice for Official Statistics to: ‘Report annually the estimated costs (for example, on businesses, service providers, or the public) of responding to statistical surveys and strive to develop methods that will reduce the costs to individual organisations or people.’ The ONS collects compliance information from all Government Departments in the UK (excluding Scotland) and publishes it in a report called the Online List of Government Statistical Surveys. This publication was set up a number of years ago to meet the Code of Practice obligation. Like any output the quality should be assessed on a regular basis. Current metrics on the use of the Online List are minimal; this is an indication that the quality needs to be improved. A list of all Government Statistical surveys and their compliance is beneficial for a multitude of reasons, therefore, a user review needed to be conducted to improve quality, exposure and capability. The processes are being reviewed by Methodology to ensure the current methodology is fit for purpose, the publication itself is having a facelift, and users are being asked what they want. The main focus of the user review is to explore: - who uses compliance information, - what is compliance information used for, - is there any additional information users would like. The paper details users and data compilers feedback, along with recommendations made to improve the publication and prevent misuse of data. |