Addis Ababa, 10 January 2016 (ECA) - The Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) will this month run a post-World Data Forum workshop in Cape Town, South Africa, to discuss the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals indicator framework.
The workshop, which runs from 19-20 January, seeks to reflect on the preparation of national indicator frameworks based on national, regional and global priorities, and on the roadmaps for the development of a clear set of strategies to strengthen national statistical systems and their deliveries in line with the Global Action Plan.
Directors General of national statistics offices, senior statisticians from the relevant implementing entities and other global, regional and sub-regional organizations and partner institutions will attend the workshop.
African Centre for Statistics Director Oliver Chinganya says the workshop aims in particular to guide member countries in the development of a comprehensive national indicator framework to measure, monitor and report on the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, Africa’s 50-year development plan, Agenda 2063, and other national and regional development policies.
“Participants will, among other things, identify major challenges in the production and utilization of SDG indicators for Africa as well as reflect and share best practices on the implementation of the indicator framework, according to recommendations and priorities articulated in national strategies through conducting data gap assessments,” said Mr. Chinganya.
The workshop also seeks to galvanize support at country level for the incorporation of main recommendations for the development of statistical capacities from the Global Action Plan, and other key decisions from inter-governmental processes, into multi-year programmatic instruments such as the national strategies for the development of statistics (NSDS).
It will also increase awareness of the UN’s Development Account Programme among other bilateral and multilateral partners leading to improved coordination and synergies, leveraging financial support, and avoiding an activity overlap by other partners.
During the period leading up to the adoption of the 2030 Agenda, there was widespread acknowledgement by member States and the UN system of the critical need to strengthen at all levels, the capacity of statistical systems to produce timely and reliable statistics and data to assess the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals and targets.
The ten-year implementation plan (2014-2023) of the Africa Agenda 2063 has also placed huge demands for statistics on African countries. The demand for disaggregated data will certainly pose difficulties and increase the level of complexity for developing countries, many of which face challenges to produce even basic statistics which meet international standards hence the workshop comes in handy as the continent seeks to confront those challenges head-on.
Note to Editors
In view of the enormous demands that will be placed on the United Nations to provide support to developing member States in the area of statistics and data, 10 entities of the UN Secretariat have joined hands to implement a comprehensive programme of action centred around strengthening national statistical systems to measure, monitor and report on the sustainable development goals.
The Development Account (DA) Programme on data and statistics will be collaboratively implemented by the 10 entities during the period 2016-2019.
The Programme by definition and design aims to strengthen national statistical systems to respond to the data challenges of the 2030 Agenda. Through these efforts, it also supports national capacity to assess countries’ internal readiness for measuring and reporting on all of the 17 Goals, and defining the short-term and long-term actions needed for increasing its capacity to produce accurate and timely data in a sustainable manner.
The workshop, which is being organized as a post event of United Nations World Data Forum, will be held at the Cape Town international Convention Centre from 19-20 January.
The first UN World Data Forum will be hosted by Statistics South Africa from 15 to 18 January 2017, with support from the Statistics Division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, under the guidance of the United Nations Statistical Commission and the High-level Group for Partnership, Coordination and Capacity-Building for Statistics for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Issued by:
Communications Section
Economic Commission for Africa
PO Box 3001
Addis Ababa
Ethiopia
Tel: +251 11 551 5826
E-mail: ecainfo@uneca.org