Capacity Building: Achievements and Issues of National Statistical System of Sri Lanka D. B. P. Suranjana Vidyaratne, Director General, Dept. of Census and Statistics – Sri Lanka Steering Committee Meeting of UNSD and Leaders of National Statistical Offices of SAARC Countries - 21st July 2008: Colombo

National Statistical System of Sri Lanka 1.The statistical system in Sri Lanka is a mixed system but more closer to a centralized system. 2.Sri Lanka’s National Statistical Agency is the Department of Census and Statistics (DCS) 3.DCS plays co-ordinatory and technical supervisory role over the statistical branch offices in Ministries, Departments and Provincial, District and Divisional administration 4.DCS provides trained statistical cadres required by the branch offices and provincial / district offices etc. 5.The legal authority vested in the DCS under the Census and Statistics Ordinances has enabled the DCS to successfully undertake most of the statistical operations in a coordinated manner.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building

1.Provide opportunities for staff to further their studies 2.Increase participation of officers in international training, seminars and workshops 3.Participate in international activities 4.Provide statistical advisory services 5.Use computer assisted technology for survey interviews and coding 6.Set up databases 7.Hold forums to publicize the findings 8.Increase personnel skill training programme 9.Document all job processes for future reference 10.Improve sampling techniques 11.Strengthen Special Studies and Research 12.Set up a statistical training institute 13.Publish statistical journal for articles based on research findings 14.Implement job rotation 15.Provide incentives for personnel who create innovative products and services 16.Form think-tank groups to produce innovative statistical products

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Provide opportunities for staff to further their studies  The staff of the Department is encouraged to further their studies  For selected courses the Department fully funds the course fee and for other courses, partly  Duty leave is also granted for studies  Department fully utilizes the scholarships received from various organizations including the United Nations agencies to train its staff  DCS recently compiled a resource directory of training institutes  In this directory particulars such as names of the international agencies providing training, their contact details, course fees etc are included  It is now very convenient to find a place for training whenever we need to train our staff on specific areas and necessary funds are available  We need to explore the possibility of sharing expertise of our countries in the region by means of training, exchange programmes etc

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Increase participation of officers in international training, seminars and workshops  DCS is trying its best to get opportunities from donors to send its officers for international seminars and workshops.  Attempts are also made to increase participation of officers by finding assistances from donors. A few examples for this are:  Recently assistance were obtained from UNICEF to send few officers abroad for training on database management.  With the assistance from the Ministry of Finance and Planning, a group of 30 officers were sent to India for training.  With funds available under the UNDP assisted MDG programme, several officers were sent out for training.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Participate in international activities  DCS willingly participates at international activities. A few examples for this are  Conducting the Demographic and Health Survey in collaboration with the Macro International. Under this activity DCS got an opportunity to train its staff on a wide range of statistical activities covering questionnaire design to report writing  Sri Lanka is one of the Asian countries participating in the Accelerated Data Programme implemented in collaboration with the Asian Development Bank. With this programme DCS commenced archiving all statistical products of the Department including micro data, publications, questionnaires etc.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Provide statistical advisory services  The Department has set up statistical units in most of the government Departments and Ministries.  Trained statistical staff of the DCS are posted to these units.  Statistical advisory services to government Departments and Ministries are provided mainly through these units.  Advisory services are provided to privates sector, UN organizations etc in a limited way.  Due to staff and other limitations, DCS cannot entertain all requests on statistical advisory services.  By providing advisory services, DCS get an opportunity to further strengthen interactions with other agencies.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Use computer assisted technology for survey interviews and coding  The Department is testing computer assisted coding with Household Income and Expenditure Survey.  Partly, data entry of this survey has been decentralized.  Based on the success of above activities, this technology will be extended to all other surveys and censuses.  Computer assisted technology is yet to be used for survey interviews.  Initial cost of computer assisted technology for survey interviews is high. But it is likely to help improving accuracy, reliability and timeliness of statistics.  IMPS software package, which has facilities for computerized editing, validation, imputations and tabulations is largely used for data entry and processing of survey and census data at DCS.  DCS is lacking ICT infrastructure particularly on remote data transferring.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Set up databases for internal and external use towards more effective data dissemination system  The MDG database and another few interactive databases have already been included in the Department’s website.  A Meta database for the Department is being prepared under the Accelerated Data Programme, with the assistance of Asian Development Bank.  Access to this Meta database will be given to users through the DCS website.  All micro data (of the National Statistical System) will be archived and released to the users in accordance with the conditions laid down in the Data Dissemination Policy of the Department.  This is the first systematic attempt that the DCS made to archive its data.  A copy of the Data dissemination Policy is available in the DCS website.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Hold forums to publicize the findings  DCS holds forums to publicize findings.  Frequency of holding such forums are not at satisfactory levels due to resource limitations.  When DCS estimated poverty indices at lower level administrative units, large number of such forums were held to publicize the findings. The government used findings for planning development programmes.  Regular quarterly press briefings are held to release National Accounts, labour force statistics etc.  DCS staff get an opportunity to meet the press and other users through these forums.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Increase personnel skill training programme  DCS train its staff not only on the subject matter but also on other skills such as presentations, administration etc.  DCS does not have enough resource persons for this area.  Sri Lanka Institute for Development Administration (SLIDA) is a government agency that has been established to train mainly government officials in many fields including personnel skills.  DCS officers are sent to places like SLIDA for such training programmes.  DCS also invite eminent personnel in this field to conduct programmes to its staff.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Document all job processes for future reference  Documentation is important in providing a resource for evidence-based decision making.  In the light of this, the technical divisions are preparing manuals to documenting all methods, procedures etc. of surveys, censuses and special studies conducted by them.  Availability of well documented manuals ensure smooth flow of activities in the divisions even in the absence of officers due to taking leave, retiring, migrating etc. Any officer taking over can follow the manuals and continue the work.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Improve sampling techniques  DCS has a Sample Survey Division and qualified samplers.  Well defined household sampling frame has been prepared and sample of household are drawn using this frame for all household surveys.  Sampling techniques will further be improved for establishment based surveys.  Sample survey division will be further strengthened to provide advisory services on sampling which is in high demand from many organizations who want to conduct studies for their own purposes.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Strengthen the special studies and research  DCS has undertaken several important studies under ‘special studies and research’. Preparation of MDG reports, Studies on men and women are some of those studies. Findings of these studies have found to be very useful.  Special Studies and Research should be further improved by identifying and sending officers for specialized training in methodology and the usage of software packages for statistical estimation, forecasting and analysis.  Research work on preparation of national accounts including review of methodologies, estimation of national accounts at sub-national levels have now become priority areas.  Qualitative studies are very important in analyzing unexpected situations. For example reasoning of unexpected price fluctuations of food commodities. DCS staff need to be trained in this area.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Publish statistical journal for articles based on research findings  DCS does not have its own journal, which would have been useful for publishing the findings of the research work of its staff.  I suggest we launch a journal of NSO’s of SAARC region, encouraging our staff to engage in research not only in our own countries but also in the region as well.  At DCS, only a few officers are currently carrying out research work.  It is imperative to expose all the staff officers to this culture as without research the subject cannot be developed.  This requires training of the officers particularly on research methodology and report witting skills.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Implement job rotation  Staff get bored by working on the same subject and sitting in the same place/division over a long period of time.  For duty requirements and based on the availability of vacancies staff is transferred. Other than this DCS does not have a rotation policy.  DCS is now in the process of preparing a policy for rotation of its officers among technical divisions.  A committee has been setup to draft this policy.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Provide incentives for personnel who create innovative products and services  A system has been introduced to issue commendation letters for exceptional contributors.  There are limitations in cash reward system or any other way of appreciating exceptional contributions.  According to the current system, even in promotions what matters most is the number of years of experience and not the contributions or innovations.

Key activities being carried out under capacity building Form think-tank groups to produce innovative statistical products  Formation of such groups has been commenced from the the National Accounts Division of the Department.  We need to further improve estimation methodology, verification and interpretation of National Accounts.  Earlier, both Central Bank of Sri Lanka and the DCS used to compile National Accounts.  Now the sole responsibility is lying with the DCS.  Therefore, lot of research, innovations etc need to be carried out in this area and think-tank groups are expected contribute particularly in these areas.  Overall objective of forming think-tank groups is to build a dedicated and committed workforce over the coming years.

Statistical Capacity Building Project: Future Plans

Statistical Capacity Building Project: Future plans With the assistance of the World Bank, DCS is to implement a Capacity Building Project called STATCAP. It has two components namely: 1.Capacity Building 2.Construction of a building for the DCS

Capacity Building: Key Performance Indicators - Future plans Following are the expected outcomes of the STATCAP 1.Improved poverty monitoring, better informed economic and social policy evaluation and decision-making 2.Annual data collection plans and long-term strategies produced 3.Training plan established, executed and updated annually 4.Institutional reforms to strengthen capacity of the statistical system and its autonomy and achieve fuller compliance with international statistical standards 5.Establishing an integrated meta and database of all major economic and social statistics and ensure that it is available for users, measured by increase in number of visitors to website 6.Reduction of duplicative data collection and compilations through greater coordination 7.Improved efficiency of data collection methods through decentralized data entry 8.Developing statistical series which are compatible with international standards and conform to the needs of sustained economic development 9.Making effective use of IT to achieve high efficiency in survey design, data collection, transmission, processing, management and dissemination

Construction of an office Building: Future plans Construction of an office building DCS is presently housed in seven different rented locations. This situation has and continues to exert adverse effects on the performance of DCS. It is time consuming and inefficient for the units in separate locations to work together or even just meet. That aside, the inconvenience, and cost are considerable. Under the STATACAP it has been planned to construct a building to house all the divisions of the DCS.

Conclusion The ultimate target of the Department is to become a leading statistical organization internationally while providing customer-focused official statistical information and statistical services of international standard, for national planning and development through well-trained and competent personnel, use of superior technology and methodology, adoption of best practices in all statistical activities and enhanced research and statistical analysis.

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