Best practice for ensuring quality in international statistics

- The Principal Global Indicators -

Werner Bier, Per Nymand-AndersenEuropean Central Bank

Committee for the Coordination of Statistical Activities (CCSA)

Conference on quality in international Statistics, Athens, 29 May 2012

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• Policy needs for International Statistics

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• Statistical challenges

Ensuring quality and best practice •Concepts and methodology•Operational set-up

• Principle Global Indicators (PGIs)

Overview

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1 4 2 3 International Statistics

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Policy needs for multilateral surveillance and coordination

The financial and sovereign debt crisis has revealed that

• Interconnectedness and interdependence among open economies play an important role in the size, nature and policy responses of systemic risks

• Systemic risks depend on the collective behaviour of financial intermediaries, markets, infrastructures and depends on the interaction between the financial

system and the real economy

1 Policy needs for International Statistics

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Policy needs for multilateral surveillance and coordination

• Policy responses remain mainly bound to the national territory (exceptional cases supranational (e.g. ECB))

• Multilateral policy responses are crucial for mitigating risks to financial stability and for creating strong, sustainable and balanced growth

• Multilateral policy responses require enhanced and global comparable economic and financial statistics and indicators

1 Policy needs for International Statistics

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Policy needs for multilateral surveillance and coordination

• Group of 20 (G20) Leaders' requested a range of statistical indicators to identify large imbalances among economics (Seoul Summit)

• The main priority actions relate to reduce excessive imbalances and to maintain current account imbalances at sustainable levels

• For this purpose, a set of comparable statistical indicators is required

1 Policy needs for International Statistics

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Policy needs for multilateral surveillance and coordination

1 Policy needs for International Statistics

• Main comparable international indicators:

public debt and fiscal deficits

private savings rate

private debt

external imbalance

• Easy accessibility of official statistics/indicators

• G20 and Global statistical aggregates (e.g. G20 GDP)

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Concepts and methodology

• International statistical standards are available

• Fundamental Principles and agreed Quality frameworks exist

• Excellent international and regional networks and governance among national statistical agencies and international organisations are in place

• Data exchange formats among international and supranational organisations (SDMX) are developed

Ensuring quality and best practice 2

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Operational set-up

The key statistical challenges lie in the ability to

• coordinate among the network of international and national authorities

• synchronise the various statistical activities

• converge and apply a common set of statistical concepts, guidance and methodological notes

• governance assessments – check and balances

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Operational set-up

• Do the statistical authorities agree on the detailed statistical requirements ?

• Have the international statistical standards been applied ?

• Is the data flow from national authorities to international organisations synchronised ?

• Limited (timely) G20 and Global aggregates available (G20 quarterly growth rates)

If statisticians do not deliver – the market will

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First results to meet G20 demands

Principal Global Indicators (PGIs)

Inter-Agency Group on Economic and Financial Statistics

BIS, ECB, Eurostat, IMF, OECD, UN and the World Bank

Focus on

• the G20 economies plus 5 non-G20 Financial Stability Board (FSB) countries

• key economic and financial statistics and indicators

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Principal Global Indicators (PGIs) 3

First results to meet G20 demands

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First results to meet G20 policy demandExternal debt /Real GDP

Principal Global Indicators (PGIs) 3

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Statistical challenges

The PGIs will be further enhanced to

• comply with the data transmission standard SDMX

• support visualisation tools

• include additional G20 and global aggregates

• become a supporting tool for G20 policies

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Statistical challenges

The Inter-Agency Group therefore continues to work on the (detailed) statistical requirements:

Agreement on detailed reporting templates (coverage, frequency, timeliness, adjustments)

Tier 1: Core Aggregates; Tier 2: Detailed breakdowns; Tier 3: Specificities of the individual economy

Agreement on the data flow among the international organisations, including

the related quality management

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Statistical challenges

The Inter-Agency Group members aim at

• applying common reporting templates and implementation plans

a pilot project on sector accounts and their integration with e.g. government finance statistics and securities issues statistics

• synchronising the data sources/flow and quality monitoring (Who does what by when)

• applying the SDMX concept to the PGIs

• involving the G20 economies where needed

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• Official statistics is called upon to support multilateral surveillance policies in a world of global imbalances and uneven global recovery (G20 policy driven needs)

• The international and national statistical authorities have the statistical, technical and organisational skills to master this challenge (close cooperation)

• Pilot exercises are needed to prove effective international cooperation by releasing comparable and timely international statistics

• The policy needs are there. If the statistical authorities can not deliver, the market will replace them

Conclusions 4