(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) The critical role of statistics in advancing the Region’s development through the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) was examined at a series of meetings held recently in Paramaribo, Suriname.

The Thirty-Second Meeting of the Standing Committee of Caribbean Statisticians (SCCS) and the 15th Meeting of the Regional Census Coordinating Committee (RCCC) were both held at the Hotel Krasnapolsky in Paramaribo.

The SCCS meeting, held under the theme `Enabling the Development of the CSME through Evidence-based Policy – The Case for Increasing Investment in Statistics’, received the report of the first meeting of the Advisory Group on Statistics (AGS). The AGS meeting, held prior to the SCCS, was aimed at advancing the process of implementing the Regional Statistical Work Programme (RSWP) in Member States as mandated by the Community Council in 2005.

AGS Chairperson, Director-General of the Statistical Institute of Jamaica (STATIN) Ms. Sonia Jackson, presented to the SCCS, the Terms of Reference and the Rules of Procedures of the Advisory Group and the Implementation Plan. The objectives of the Plan are to:

Establish and develop a framework to achieve the implementation of the Regional Statistical Work Programme in CARICOM Member States and Associate Members in a manner that will result in the production of a common core of harmonized, high quality and timely statistics in the Region; Ensure that the Resolution calling on Governments to increase investment in Statistics as a priority in the Region is implemented.

The SCCS also received reports of the modernization of the statistical system in Belize, Suriname, Jamaica and Guyana, and the plans to modernize the national statistical system in Barbados. A new data submission protocol and Action Plan for the improvement in the production and submission of Merchandise Trade Statistics under a Project funded by the IDB was also reviewed.

In addition, the SCCS was informed of progress with the production of National Accounts and International Trade in Services Statistics and progress on the preparation of Caribbean Specific Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). With regard to the latter, the focus was on measurement of the United Nations MDGs and how those indicators could be used as key mechanisms for monitoring and evaluating development at the national and regional levels.

Other deliberations and decisions arising out of the 32nd SCCS included the implementation of a Literacy Assessment and Monitoring Programme in Saint Lucia, the Statistics Week of Barbados as a model for promoting the usefulness and importance of statistics to the public including schoolchildren.

Contact: piu@caricom.org