Paper by Paris21: “…argues that the statistical community has reached a fork in the road. Incremental adjustment alone may no longer be sufficient. Countries and the international community face a strategic choice between two broad paths, each with distinct implications for legitimacy, financing, risk and equity. Rather than prescribing a single solution, the paper provides a framework to facilitate informed debate among all stakeholders of official statistics as they chart a course towards more sustainable and inclusive data systems. It is also the foundation for a forthcoming series of policy briefs that will explore specific aspects of this theme in greater depth and help sharpen policy attention to key areas.
This is a decisive moment for official statistical systems.
Deep cuts in development financing for statistics, legitimacy issues, artificial intelligence and other rapid technological changes, and rising expectations for more inclusive and participatory data are colliding with long-standing weaknesses in trust, capacity and data use. For many national statistical offices (NSOs), particularly in low- and middle-income countries, this convergence amounts to a systemic data crisis that threatens their relevance, credibility and sustainability. At the same time, these pressures create a rare opportunity to rethink how data systems are designed, governed and embedded in society…(More)”.
