Business

Statistics law to be approved soon

Autonomous Pakistan Bureau of Statistics to be established.

Mobin Nasir March 12, 2011

KARACHI:

The National Assembly is expected to approve a new law that will restructure the entire national statistical system, according to Federal Secretary Statistics Division Asif Bajwa on Saturday.

Addressing a seminar entitled ‘Contributions and Achievements of Official Statistics’ at the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), Bajwa said that the new law has already been approved by the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Finance.

The federal secretary also revealed that under the new law, an autonomous body will be formed to monitor the collection and recording of official statistics. The body will include members of academia and other stakeholders, besides government officials.

Once the necessary approval has been obtained, Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) will be established by merging the Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS), Population Census Organisation (PCO) and Agriculture Census Organisation (ACO).

At present, data from all three departments is available at the recently upgraded website of the Statistics Division, however, the formation of PBS will streamline the work at the departments and improve information collection and data recording, as well as lend more credibility to the new body by including academia in its fold.

Bajwa said that quarterly national accounts will be published for the first time in the first quarter of the new financial year beginning July. The publication of these accounts is among obligations that the country must meet under the Special Data Dissemination Standards of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The federal secretary also revealed Census 2011 has started and “house listing will be carried out in April while enumeration will start from September.”

Speaking at the seminar, SBP Economic Adviser Riaz Riazuddin said, “Sound policy decisions always depend on up-to-date, efficient and timely statistics.”

“The state of a country’s development can be judged from the type and quality of statistics it produces,” he said while stressing the need for improving linkages between statistics collectors and users of data.

SBP Statistics & DWH Department Director Dr Azizullah Khattak stressed the need for adopting international standards to improve the credibility of official statistics. He also pointed out that accurate and comprehensive information will help to focus on development needs as well as opportunities for the private sector.

Economic Affairs Division Deputy Chief Shamim Wazir said, “External assistance received by the country has not been used properly so the benefits of projects have not reached people,” adding, “this is the reason why the economy is under debt stress at present.”

Wazir also revealed that the $600 million under the Kerry-Lugar Act, that was supposed to be disbursed to the country this year, will not be received. He contended that the Economic Affairs Division is trying its best to renegotiate existing loans and grants to obtain better terms for the country. He also pointed out that unlike project loans, programme loans require no feasibility studies or approvals and should be avoided as their implementation is more difficult to monitor and assess.

Participants of the seminar made presentations on price statistics, national accounts, population, agriculture census statistics as well as external accounts and monetary data.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 13^th, 2011.

COMMENTS (2)

M. H. Hussain | 13 years ago | Reply I Agree with Meekal. It is long overdue; 60+ years and we still can't produce such basic data as quarterly GDP, let alone provincial GDP (which is politically more "dangerous", perhaps that's the reason!). Moreover, labor data is particulalry pathetic. If FBS can publish the data of Large Scale Manufacturing (LSM) production on "monthly basis", it can do so for LSM employment as well, and perhaps more easily. Inflation basket needs to be revamped as well; more than 20% of headline inflation index (CPI) is dominated by House Rent Index, whose YoY cyclical path shows as if it is artifically constructed. I must say that SBP's Statistics and DWH department is doing a much more professional and shophisticated job than FBS.

Meekal Ahmed | 13 years ago | Reply This is probably the best news on the economic front even if it is 62 years too late. Having worked with our statistics for three decades I can vouch for their inconsistency, unreliability and incredibility. They are, with a few exceptions such as the monetary statistics which are quite good, bordering on the bogus. No one believes the inflation numbers. If inflation is under-stated, output is over-stated. Since every economic variable is linked in one way or another to output, there is a cascading of errors in the national accounts. No one believes the savings and investment figures and the growth of the SME sector which we all talk about is a FIXED coefficient which is repeated year after year since no one has bothered to do a survey of the sector. Export and import data are suspect. No one knows the REAL amount of spending on defense. The Labor Force Survey is completely bogus, showing a rate of open unemployment that would be the envy of the western world. Data on minor crops, livestock, forestry, fisheries, services, wholesale and retail trade and construction are also highly suspect. The implications of bad data are serious. Even the best policies will prove unavailing since the data mislead.

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