Strategy for Statistical Cooperation with the Enlargement ...
|[pic] |EUROPEAN COMMISSION |
| |EUROSTAT |
| | |
| |Directorate A: Cooperation in the European Statistical System; International cooperation; Resources |
| |Unit A3: Statistical cooperation |
DRAFT
Strategy for Statistical Cooperation with the Enlargement Countries 2014 – 2020
March 2014
Table of Contents
Foreword 3
1. Introduction and background 5
2. Current situation in statistics 7
3. Future challenges for statistics 9
4. Need for enhanced regional cooperation in statistics 11
5. Objectives 14
6. Instruments and costs 22
7. Monitoring and evaluation 27
Annex 1 Compliance 29
Annex 2 Main features of service contracts and grants 31
Annex 3 Advantages and disadvantages of service contracts and grants 33
Foreword
Reliable and comparable statistics is essential for managing the Stabilisation and Association Process (SAP) with the enlargement countries. This Strategy for Statistical Cooperation with enlargement countries for the period 2014–2020 establishes the rationale, objectives, means and results of a cooperation framework aiming at supporting the enlargement countries to aligning their statistical production with the European Union (EU) standards.
The strategy ensures efficient use of resources by focusing cooperation on those areas where improvements are most needed and by helping to make the achievements sustainable. This strategy builds on the preceding Strategy for Statistical Cooperation with candidate and potential candidate countries 2010–2013.
The reference timeframe for this strategy corresponds to the EU multi-annual financial framework 2014-2020 and to the implementation period of the new Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance (IPA II). IPA II is the single, unified instrument by means of which EU pre-accession funding is channelled to the enlargement countries.
The legal basis for this assistance is Regulation No. xxx/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance (IPA II). This Regulation is the sole pre-accession instrument for the period 2014-2020. The total pre-accession funding for the current financial framework (2014-2020) is EUR 11.7 billion.
The implementation of the pre-accession assistance under IPA II is more strategic and coherent in comparison with IPA I and concentrates funding on key reforms. IPA II has a twofold objective: accession and specific objectives of each beneficiary country according to its needs and individual enlargement agenda.
Moreover, it focuses on results and monitoring of the assistance. In line with these new elements of IPA II, the Strategy for Cooperation lists under each of its five objectives expected results and corresponding indicators for measuring these results. An annex dedicated to the level of compliance of the enlargement countries with the EU acquis has been added.
The enlargement countries[1] covered by this strategy are Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo*, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey.
The enlargement countries are not at the same level of development and are progressing towards an efficient and modern statistical system at different speeds. In most of the countries the basic principles are being followed and the institutional framework for producing statistics is in place. Efforts therefore have to focus on enhancing the availability, quality and comparability of statistics, especially in the areas that are indispensable for accession negotiations.
The enlargement countries have the common target of reaching compliance with EU statistical standards which is the basis for regional cooperation. This strategy was developed by a task force consisting of representatives of four enlargement countries and Eurostat, it has been adopted by the enlargement countries and other stakeholders of statistical cooperation through relevant meetings and consultation procedures.
The strategy is intended for use inside the European Commission, in particular the Directorate General for Enlargement and European Union Delegations, and by other donors. The document is also intended for use by the national authorities of the enlargement countries.
Introduction and background
1.1 Objectives of the Strategy for Statistical Cooperation
This document presents a common strategy for statistical cooperation with the enlargement countries, regardless of the status of the countries in the pre-accession process to the European Union, candidate or potential candidate countries.
In 2014, the countries recognized as candidate countries are Iceland, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey and potential candidate countries are Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo.
The strategy aims that the above-mentioned countries become compliant with the EU acquis in most statistical areas by the end of 2020. Compliance is meant to cover the acquis in place in 2013 while new acquis may be added in the coming years as it is a moving target both for Member States and enlargement countries.
The Strategy for Statistical Cooperation 2014-2020 is meant as a framework for developing sustainable and reliable statistical systems capable to produce statistics in accordance with the EU acquis. Significant results have been obtained in the field of statistics in the countries of the Western Balkans and Turkey which can be attributed to the large investments that have been made in the development of statistics through various assistance projects. Until now the regional approach has been the basis for good and visible results. Therefore, further support to this approach is necessary to effectively manage and develop key statistical areas and ensure sustainability of results achieved so far.
The Strategy for Statistical Cooperation is a credible and verifiable document which shows how investment in statistics brings value and what will be accomplished until the end date of this strategy.
The main goal of the strategy is to support the process of harmonising national statistical production with the EU acquis, bearing in mind that this is a strategy paper for seven different countries and that the acquis in statistics is evolving and constantly changing. The strategy will therefore present the overall objectives that countries have to achieve while the definition of more targeted objectives for the enlargement countries will be done at cooperation programme level.
The objective of the strategy is to highlight key areas of statistics which are of common interest and in need of development and describe the impact good quality statistics can have on the development of good policies. Monitoring of the implementation of the strategy should be result oriented and evaluated by means of measurable indicators.
1.2 The role of official statistics (policy relevance)
Statistics plays a vital role in every field of human activity. The general mission of statistics, essential for a democratic society, is to provide all categories of users with the appropriate statistical information needed for a functioning society. Its role is more important today in the context of information society, when the society becomes more complex, globalisation and developments in information technology open up new opportunities and policy design and monitoring are more important for many parts of the society.
Consequently, statistics is vital, as governments, administrations and politicians responsible for political, economic and social decisions need information both to check the necessity of political initiatives and to monitor the efficiency of implementing these policies.
In the case of candidate countries, statistics has a supplementary role, namely supporting the negotiation process in the interest of both negotiating partners, in order to avoid disputes on facts and figures.
The role of the National Statistical Institutes (NSIs) is based on three pillars, each of them playing a key role in the development of a sustainable and reliable statistical system producing data in accordance with the EU acquis.
The first pillar is production of official statistics for policy makers. This is ensured through the national statistical strategy documents prepared by NSIs. The role of official statistics can be seen in all phases of the development and updates of statistical indicators from different statistical domains, which are relevant for country policy purposes as stated in the Country Strategy Papers which are aligned with South East Europe 2020 Strategy.
|Statistical domain |Enlargement-linked policies |
|Science and technology, research statistics |EU research policy, framework programmes |
|National accounts, EDP statistics, price statistics, BoP |Economic governance |
|External trade |Trade policy |
|Trade in goods and services, balance of payments |Commercial Policy |
|Transport statistics |Transport Policy, TEN |
|Price statistics, regional GDP |Cohesion policy, Structural funds |
|Business statistics, trade statistics, services statistics |Internal Market, four freedoms |
|Business statistics, industry structure, production, short term |Industrial, SME and other sector policies |
|indicators | |
|Labour and other economic statistics |Growth and employment |
|Labour statistics, living conditions, social protection, population |Social policy |
|and migration statistics | |
|Audio-visual statistics, culture statistics, health, education |Culture, health, education, consumer protection |
|statistics | |
|Agriculture and fisheries statistics |Agricultural and Fisheries Policies, food security |
|Energy, industry and environment statistics |Energy and environment policies |
|Population, GDP, environment, poverty, demography statistics |SEE 2020 Strategy |
|Economic governance |Budget policy and forecast, Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure, |
| |socio-economic development, improvement of business environment |
In addition NSIs must ensure that statistics meet the necessary quality standards. This is closely related to the second pillar: commitment to the European Statistics Code of Practice (CoP). It is of essential importance for each and every NSI that official statistics is developed, produced and disseminated in accordance with the fifteen principles of the European Statistics Code of Practice: professional independence, mandate for data collection, adequacy of resources, quality commitment, statistical data confidentiality, impartiality and objectivity, sound methodology, appropriate statistical procedures, non-excessive burden on respondents, cost effectiveness, relevance, accuracy and reliability, timeliness and punctuality, coherence and comparability and accessible and clear data. Implementation of the CoP will allow rising the confidence of users in the data produced and disseminated by the NSIs.
Finally, the third pillar of the NSIs is their coordination role within the statistical system of the country. A National Statistical Institute should be the responsible authority for producing and disseminating official statistical data and the responsible body, organizer and coordinator of the national statistical system representing the national official statistics in the international statistical system. In the common interest of efficient public administration and rationalisation of the production of statistics, NSIs should be involved in the design or modifications of administrative registers in order to increase availability of administrative data for statistical purposes.
Current situation in statistics
This section describes the situation of the national statistical systems in the enlargement countries. During the last few years, improvements have taken place in all countries, but still a lot remains to be done in several statistical areas in order to develop and maintain institutional capacity and infrastructure. Official statistics in enlargement countries is based on the UN Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics and on the European Statistics Code of Practice. These documents provide the basic principles and criteria for establishing sustainable national systems of official statistics.
2.1 General situation
All the countries aspiring to EU membership have registered steady progress towards compliance with the EU acquis in the field of statistics. The general level of knowledge of the acquis has significantly improved. Policy makers are aware of the key role played by NSIs in providing accurate, timely and reliable data needed for developing a democratic society and a functioning market economy. Development of national statistical systems to a level comparable to the one in the current Member States and their integration into the European Statistical System (ESS) are necessary elements in the accession process. The general capacity of the NSIs to produce timely and comprehensive statistical information in a comparable way and based on high quality standards has increased but is still not sufficient in most enlargement countries.
The enlargement countries have relatively centralised statistical systems with a major part of official statistics being produced by NSIs. There are, however, other important providers of official statistics such as central banks, ministries and other public bodies. In all enlargement countries, the NSI is the coordinating body of the statistical systems, but this role needs to be further strengthened.
A basic legal framework for statistics exists and is constantly being improved in all countries. It ensures that the basic principles of professional independence, mandate for data collection, confidentiality, impartiality, relevance and reliability of statistics are observed. In practice, the majority of the principles in the European Statistics Code of Practice are applied. The implementation of these principles is important in order to achieve credibility of statistical information and confidence among key stakeholders. Persistent efforts to maintain and increase this confidence will be needed in this area in the coming years.
A planning and programming system is in place and it is based on multi-annual statistical programmes and annual implementation plans. Country Strategy Papers concerning statistics are in place pointing to the major statistical areas to be developed in the medium and long term. Methods of monitoring programme implementation are still in an initial phase. Some countries have adopted quality policies and started to develop their own in-house system for quality management and reporting. The management skills of top and middle management, in particular in planning processes, are improved as part of a quality framework, but nevertheless, there is still room for further improvements.
The coordination role of NSIs as the national focal point for developing and implementing methodology and classifications and collecting, producing and disseminating statistical data has been strengthened. Cooperation with users and training of users on how to find and interpret official statistics has improved. There are established partnerships with main stakeholders such as ministries of finance, central banks or tax authorities. These partnerships are managed via signed protocols, agreements or memoranda.
Staff within the NSIs is mainly trained with the support of international experts and through participation in international meetings, workshops and seminars organised by the international community. As the countries are at different levels of development, strong regional cooperation especially in the frame of common projects, has contributed considerably to transferring knowledge among NSIs.
Most NSIs are facing understaffing and insufficient financing. That is even more aggravated by budget restrictions triggered by the recent economic crisis. Starting from a low level, capacity was strengthened with recruitment of new staff. This increase in staff number needs to continue to allow NSIs to improve the scope, the timeliness and the quality of statistics. Some NSIs have tried to develop measures for the flexible use of existing human resources.
2.2 Progress achieved over the past 5 years
In general, visible progress has been made in the enlargement countries. Countries already produce a number of statistics in line with EU standards, although progress achieved differs across countries and further improvements are needed. The exchange of data with Eurostat is a key element of the integration into the ESS and the process of data transmission from the enlargement countries to Eurostat is still at an early stage.
The population and housing censuses have been conducted in most countries in order to provide reliable and updated demographic data of the population of the country. Some census results have already been released.
Macroeconomic statistics has been improved in all countries in terms of providing basic GDP figures, but the system of national accounts still differs across countries, and NSIs face the challenge of the ESA 2010 implementation. Several countries include the non-observed economy into the GDP figures and produce quarterly GDP in constant and current prices. All countries have developed good external trade statistics. Most countries are advanced in calculating purchasing power parities (PPP). In some countries the production of the Harmonized Index of Consumer Prices has started.
In Business statistics basic data are available for trade, industry, tourism, transport, construction and services, however not always in full scope, quality and frequency. Structural business statistics (SBS) and short-term statistics (STS) registered some progress in terms of availability of data on the structures of business sectors and short term business indicators. The content of the statistical business registers as a framework for business surveys is progressing by using new administrative sources but still needs constant improvement and enhancement. Data on the usage of ICT by households, individuals and enterprises are available in some countries. Annual energy balances are being produced.
Agricultural statistics is being improved. The agricultural census has been organised in several countries in order to provide reliable data on agriculture production. Economic accounts for agriculture and a statistical farm register are being developed in some countries.
Environmental statistics such as data on waste and water are available, and work on producing environmental accounts and sustainable development indicators has started in some countries.
Social indicators are becoming available due to progress achieved in data production as a result of numerous new surveys conducted in the past years. Demographic data, labour market statistics, employment/unemployment data and data on the income and expenditure of households are available. Some countries are producing the labour cost index, data on the time use by individuals, social protection and income and living conditions.
Referring to the infrastructure elements of a statistical system the following is to be noted:
Classifications and nomenclatures in compliance with EU and international standards (including NACE, CPA, PRODCOM, NUTS, COICOP, ISCED, ISCO and others) have been put in practice in most countries. Updates with the latest version are done regularly. However a certain delay can sometimes be noticed.
Dissemination of statistical products has significantly improved in all countries. Most countries have developed new websites containing electronic publications, databases, release calendars, catalogue of publications and methodological explanations, also available in English.
Information and communication technologies (ICT) are at an acceptable level in most countries and staff is regularly trained. In view of further developments in the area of information technology, ICT strategies provide the regular upgrade of ICT capacities.
Quality of statistics has become a major topic in several countries and frameworks and strategies are being developed.
Future challenges for statistics
Official statistics will have to rely on vision and strategy in preparing for the future. While the future is notoriously difficult to predict, the main challenges facing the European Statisticians seem relatively clear. In the foreseeable future producers of official statistics will be expected to modernize, produce more statistics, do it better, faster and in a more cost-effective manner. As in the past the road forward is about accepting change and making the most of technology and human resources but this time the quality of the statistical products will be at the centre of attention.
There has been a trend of ever-increasing demand for official statistics, in particular for measuring cross-cutting complex social and economic issues. This goes along with a simultaneous request for reduction in the burden posed by data collection from enterprises and individuals. Parallel to these demands, austerity in government finances has required substantial cuts on the financial and human resources in the Member States as well as in the enlargement countries. This situation is expected to continue in the coming years. These dualistic demands will be the driving force behind the modernization of statistical production.
The outlines of modernization have already been drawn in the vision and vision implementation plans of the Commission (Eurostat) and corresponding developments are taking place within NSIs in Member States and even some enlargement countries. In 2009 the Commission adopted the Communication COM(2009) 404 on The Production method of EU statistics: a vision for the next decade that envisages an ambitious reform of the ESS statistical production system. The Communication was successfully transformed into a Joint ESS Strategy that gives guidance on the road towards efficiency gains needed for the European Statistical System to better meet user demands. The key issues outlined are the need to reinforce the debate and the involvement of ESS partners in moving towards common solutions, shared services and a more harmonized environment.
While modernizing statistical production revolves around increasing the capacity of the European Statistical System, the most important challenge ahead is to preserve and strengthen its integrity. The very purpose of official statistics is providing impartial quality information on relevant matters and it is this quality assurance and impartiality that sets the European Statistical System apart from other providers of information. With an increasing number of statistical providers there might be some competition between official / European statistics and private data products. This will translate for users of statistics into selecting appropriate information sources to base their decisions on. High quality and impartiality of official / European statistics will play at that moment a decisive role as to the choice to be made by end users (policy makers, researchers and the wide public).
The greatest challenge for the countries aspiring to European membership will probably be to prepare for the future today. Each country has its own specific challenges but in general terms the goals to be reached are similar. For the enlargement countries the primary challenge is to prepare for implementing the EU acquis in statistics and assuming the responsibilities of a full member of the European Union. The goals are clear but the road ahead is none the less challenging because the statistical requirements for membership in the European Union develop along with the Union itself and in order to hit this moving target the enlargement countries will have to be able to aim for the future state of affairs. Progressive thinking and close cooperation with the co-ordinators of the European Statistical System will be the crucial elements for enlargement countries to successfully cross the finish line.
Need for enhanced regional cooperation in statistics
Multi-beneficiary programmes in statistics have a dominant characteristic in modelling very closely the working methods, which are also applied for the working mechanisms between Eurostat and the Member States (in the European Statistical System).
The ESS is a partnership functioning as a network with Eurostat playing the central coordinator role. Eurostat leads the way in the harmonization of statistics in close cooperation with national statistical authorities. Participation of enlargement countries in the same working groups with the Member States is an efficient tool in learning by doing, by taking part and getting informed on the practice, development and functioning of the NSIs of each Member State and the ESS as whole.
In the context of the enlargement process, Eurostat is an important source of information for the European Commission both in monitoring the performance of the NSIs of the enlargement countries in establishing sound statistical systems, and in measuring their compliance with the acquis in statistics.
By using the multi-beneficiary programme, Eurostat intends to promote a regional co-operation and networking environment in the area of statistics among enlargement countries and to support them in the alignment of their statistical data with European standards and finally to prepare them for the accession.
This chapter deals on the one hand, with arguments in favour of the mechanisms created by multi-beneficiary programmes, and, on the other hand, it identifies the risk of their suspension. The main arguments are:
• Economy of scale effects;
• Synergy and coordination effects;
• Timing aspects;
• Development of the acquis in statistics over time as a moving target;
• Good results of previous multi-beneficiary programmes.
New multi-beneficiary statistical programmes will build on success, good practices and experience of the previous ones. This sound multilateral environment will be the framework for pursuing the common objective clearly stated in the enlargement process.
Economy of scale effects
Multi-beneficiary programmes require a considerable amount of steering and co-ordinating activities to be delivered from a central body. On the other hand, the number of beneficiaries only marginally impacts this activity. In the context of reduced resources of Member States' NSIs providing most of the assistance and of generally limited resources to support the countries, a multi-beneficiary programme is the most efficient way of assisting enlargement countries in reaching and maintaining the acquis. Multi-beneficiary programmes can provide common training, common workshops and other common activities in which all the countries are taught the same methodology at the same time with experts' input provided once.
Common training and teaching also allows common standards to be passed on to all enlargement countries thereby ensuring that all of them know and apply the same standards. This approach of common training is also encouraged for Member States because it is one way to make sure that all countries apply European standards in the same way.
Synergies and coordination effects
A regional programme defines common needs for all enlargement countries and, therefore is a common denominator for the region as a whole. Consequently, it contributes to the development of the region. The centralized approach under a regional programme as to the delivery of the technical assistance provides a common frame for all enlargement countries for the development of statistics. This frame is at the same time tailored to the specific needs of each country.
A mutual understanding and exchange of experiences/best practices contributes to a better transfer of know-how and a better management of processes and, consequently, to better results with lower costs. The multi-country approach provides the best framework for using these synergies as working together is promoted via this approach.
The multi-beneficiary programme is also a good instrument for coordination with other statistical producers within the countries. Providers and all participants in the programme speak a common language in statistics and benefit from the programme in the same way.
In addition to the multi-beneficiary assistance from EU, a bottom-up initiative by the NSIs in South East Europe has emerged, the so-called Budva Initiative Group (named after an initial meeting in Budva, Montenegro, in 2008). This regional cooperation is similar to other examples of regional cooperation among statistical offices elsewhere in Europe. The Budva initiative is an example of how the multi-country approach has contributed to promoting networking, cooperation and sharing within the countries in the region.
Timing aspects
The design and monitoring of policies need good quality statistics, usually long before the policy is put in place. This is true at national level but also at European level. Negotiations with countries on their way to accession need support in terms of harmonised, reliable and recognised high quality statistics. Statistics requires long preparation and lead periods in order to provide such data to the negotiations and other policies. Statistics also requires continuous support as policy areas and needs evolve and hence statistics shall be available to serve these needs with relevant statistical data.
Development of the acquis in statistics as an ever moving target
New societal challenges emerge and they must be taken into consideration. They also give rise to new acquis in statistics. Common efforts will facilitate coping with new acquis (preparation for the implementation of new surveys, interpretation and transposition of European concepts to the national realities).
Good results of previous multi-beneficiary programmes
Multi-beneficiary programmes in statistics have provided widely recognised positive and concrete results in the past. This has been underlined in a number of evaluations on past multi-beneficiary statistics programmes. During these evaluations a very positive result was stated with a particular emphasis on the common training elements and the possibility to create networks of experts among the enlargement countries but also with the Member States' experts. These networks and the exchange of experience and best practices have greatly supported the advancement in statistics through previous assistance programmes. Moreover, key players, providers and recipients of know-how are now very well familiar with the mechanisms. All this provides good certainty that also new programmes will be successful.
Risk factors of suspension
A number of risk factors and negative consequences related to the suspension of multi–beneficiary programmes in statistics are identified as follows:
• in a horizon of 2-3 years a part of the knowledge already gained may be lost;
• strong reduction of the capacity to integrate into the European Statistical System due to nearly total loss of contact and influence; weakening of the capacity of NSIs to recruit and retain skilled staff with negative impact on the overall administrative capacity;
• negative effects upon data comparability and weakening of confidence in statistics of enlargement countries; slow-down of further development of data quality in statistics; increasing difficulties of bridging the still existing gaps in statistics; reduction of the absorption capacity for new acquis in the dynamically developing field of statistics;
• weakening of coordinating role of NSIs in countries and weakening of communication at international level. This also includes the very heterogeneous inputs, not only dominated by the NSIs, but by other statistics producers also;
• in terms of outputs generated by the programme, a lack of synchronisation would seriously hamper the enlargement process.
In addition, it should be underlined that Member States constantly enjoy co-operation mechanisms comparable to those created under a multi-beneficiary programme.
Objectives
A number of objectives of the strategy are described in this chapter. The description of the individual objectives is completed by a listing of expected results and possible indicators to measure progress.
5.1 Reach and maintain compliance with the EU acquis in statistics
Since one of the European Union membership criteria established at the Copenhagen Summit in 1993 is the acceptance and implementation of the EU acquis, the first objective of the strategy is to reach and maintain compliance with the acquis in statistics.
The meaning of compliance with the EU acquis in “Chapter 18 Statistics” is the production of statistics aligned with European standards and the development of National Statistical Systems (NSSs) in the enlargement countries. All EU regulations and directives are part of the EU acquis and in a broad sense, classifications and gentleman's agreements are also parts of the statistics acquis. The EU acquis covers statistical governance issues as laid down in the principles of the European Statistics Code of Practice. On the other hand, statistical data are required as input for the EU accession process for many other chapters of the body of EU law. This indicates the double role of statistics.
Considering the high importance of comparable and reliable statistical information during the accession process, there are a number of areas where fundamental and/or methodological improvements are required in the field of statistics. The selected key areas are as follows:
• Macro-Economic Statistics (Price Statistics, National Accounts including GDP, Government Finance Statistics, Purchasing Power Parities, Balance of Payments);
• Agricultural Statistics (Agricultural Accounts, Agricultural Products);
• Social Statistics (Labour Statistics, Statistics on Income and Living Conditions, Education Statistics, Demography statistics);
• Business Statistics (Structural Business Statistics, Short Term Statistics, Energy Statistics, Transport Statistics);
• International Trade Statistics;
• Statistical Registers (Business Registers, Agricultural Registers);
• other statistics (Environment statistics, ICT statistics, regional statistics).
Besides the efforts made for achieving compliance with the EU acquis in the statistical areas, the enlargement countries should also focus on increasing their capacity in this process in order to become an EU Member State taking on the full responsibility of membership.
Capacity building which has the dimensions of standards, management processes, data collection and processing, dissemination, infrastructure (legal, ICT technologies, buildings, human and financial resources) should be a continuous effort for enlargement countries. NSIs need to reform and modernize their infrastructure and adopt new developments in statistical terms and in terms of the information technology without delay. Social and technological improvements in societies lead users to demand more data of high quality in various new areas. This demand should quickly be reflected in the statistical offer such as revisions in data collection and production methodologies. Therefore, NSIs will not be likely to cease investment in their statistical capacities. In this context, maintaining compliance with the acquis is a key word, since the acquis is a "moving target".
In addition, as the EU acquis is large and contains a wide range of methodological handbooks and manuals in the various statistical domains, the alignment with the EU acquis is a long process. Further, the level of development varies from country to country.
In the context of described objective, the expected results are as follows:
a. improved availability, quality and comparability of statistical data in priority areas;
b. increased usage of administrative data sources/registers;
c. increased availability of metadata;
d. increased access to micro-data for scientific research purposes and production purposes.
Indicators to measure these expected results (in line with the letters which represent the results) are:
a. (I) number of new statistical datasets covered;
a. (II) volume of data transmitted to Eurostat, data validated and published by Eurostat;
a. (III) percentage in completeness of data in publications, such as the Eurostat pocketbook on enlargement countries or the annual Progress Reports of the EU Commission;
a. (IV) percentage of fully compliant by priority area and specific objectives derived from the annual compliance monitoring (SMIS+);
a. (V) number of quality reports;
b. (I) number of surveys replaced by administrative registers;
b. (II) number of surveys benefitting from the use of administrative data sources;
c. (I) number of ESMS (Euro SDMX Metadata Structure) files transmitted to Eurostat;
c. (II) Satisfaction of users with the available metadata, as measured in user satisfaction surveys
d. (I) number of micro-datasets provided to the researchers;
d. (II) number of prepared micro-datasets for public use;
d. (II) number of decisions to grant access to confidential data for researchers and similar data users to encounter the needs of these users from the registers in line with confidentiality rules;
In addition to the above-mentioned indicators under objective 5.1, Annex I covers the compliance levels in statistics for each country according to selected statistical areas and for key indicators and the estimation methods used to produce the figures. The compliance levels in Annex I represent estimated percentages by Eurostat for selected statistical areas and key indicators in 2013, 2017 and 2020.
5.2 Make statistics a better tool for policy purposes
Statistics is an important source for an evidence-based decision making process by policy makers at the regional, national, European and international level. It is equally important to make statistical data openly available and guarantee equal access to statistics for all users. This is how transparency of statistical work and evidence-based decision making by policy makers will be guaranteed within the society.
To make statistics a better tool for policy purposes, every NSI, as the main coordinator and disseminator of the national statistical system has to make efforts for two activities in particular: dissemination policy (improving the visibility of the data) and quality policy (produce high quality data).
Enlargement countries are in the developing phase. The first step for them is to improve the visibility of their data and demonstrate that data that are of main priority for the country and the EU integration process are produced. Users have a very long list of needs for statistical data, and they should be recommended to identify their own priorities. In addition, user needs and priorities are continuously changing and for the monitoring of these changes, NSIs need to introduce consultations and dialogues with users as a regular activity. NSIs should enhance their methods to increase transparency and availability of data through improving data clarity, data distribution channels, and communication with users.
The policy makers of today are faced with complex questions to answer and difficult decisions to take, so the crucial information that they need to have is on what is known about the current situation of the economies and societies. It is up to statisticians to produce data that could demonstrate, in a comparable way, the current state-of-play. One should not forget that macroeconomic policies and structural reforms must rely on high quality statistical information. The statistical information that policy-makers receive should be relevant, timely and accurate to make decisions on the policy direction. Resources of NSIs are limited; despite that, they are expected to produce high quality data. The unique solution foreseeable is to obtain a large amount of statistical data from administrative sources. NSIs should have the mandate to influence the creation and maintenance of administrative sources. A key activity that has to be undertaken is harmonizing methodologies used by administrative sources for collecting data to the requirements of official statistics, in fact the EU standards. In this way, the financial and response burden will be reduced, and at the same time NSIs can offer more data of higher quality. The use of administrative data will be of mutual benefit to all stakeholders.
In the context of described objective, the expected results are as follows:
a. Increased trust and confidence in statistics expressed by policy makers;
b. Dissemination policy established and implemented;
c. Increased relevance and timeliness of statistical data for policy makers.
Indicators to measure these expected results (in line with the letters which represent the results) are:
a. (I) Results expressed in user satisfaction surveys;
a. (II) The annual NSI report;
a. (III) Results of consultations with the Government, Parliament, Statistical Council and other stakeholders;
a. (IV) Number and extent of error corrections;
a. (V) External evaluation and assessment reports;
b. (I) Information on the methodology and quality of outputs is publicly available, including to policy makers;
b. (II) Instructions and guidelines on the dissemination processes are publicly available;
b. (III) Release calendars on publications and press-releases are publicly available, updated and kept;
b. (IV) Statistics is presented in a form that facilitates proper interpretation and meaningful comparisons (metadata are publicly available; all disseminated data are published with explanatory notes; education of users is strategically defined);
c. (I) Results from user satisfaction surveys;
c. (II) Delays/non-delays of data dissemination compared to the original schedule.
5.3 Integrate NSIs into the European Statistical System
The European Statistical System which was designed in order to provide reliable and comparable statistics at EU level is a network covering Eurostat, National Statistical Institutes in the EU Member States and in the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) countries as well as other national authorities of official statistics like central banks and ministries. The ESS work focuses on providing high quality statistics for EU policy areas; with the extension of EU policies, harmonization has been extended to nearly all statistical fields.
Eurostat coordinates the work of the ESS and is in charge of the development, production and dissemination of European statistics. Eurostat’s main role is to process and publish comparable statistical information at European level. In this respect, Eurostat tries to arrive at a common statistical ‘language’ via mechanisms such as the European Statistical Programmes and the relevant decision-making Committees in the ESS.
The ESS also cooperates with international organisations - the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the United Nations (UN), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (WB) -, with other Commission services and the European Central Bank at European level, and with enlargement countries. It should be stated that the national statistical authorities of enlargement countries are already partners of the ESS in the sense that they are involved in the ESS activities in order to produce comparable and reliable data on their way joining to the EU, although they are not members of the EU.
Since several years, NSIs of enlargement countries participate in EU programmes/projects and activities. They attend working groups, task forces, directors’ group meetings as well as DGINS Conferences (Directors-General of NSIs). Selected NSI staff of enlargement countries can work as trainees for a few months at Eurostat and NSIs in EU/EFTA countries. Moreover, the consultancy missions and study visits between the EU/EFTA countries and enlargement countries serve as important tools for the integration of enlargement countries into ESS as well as the bilateral partnerships between them and Member States. These activities make it easier for enlargement country experts to stay in contact with Eurostat and EU/EFTA countries, to increase the awareness and information about the ESS, and to be more involved in the ESS in addition to allowing the beneficiaries to become familiar with new techniques and acquainted with requirements of the acquis.
In this respect, the active participation in the ESS activities should be considered and ensured in line with the Eurostat Code of Principles for International Cooperation which was adopted by the meeting of the Policy Group for Statistical Cooperation (PGSC) in 2007. They allow the integration of NSIs staff into the European statistical network and also increase motivation to upgrade their work to the level of their peers in the ESS countries.
In addition to the issues mentioned above, the contribution of Eurostat is of crucial importance for the efficient coordination among partners. Strong communication channels should be built between NSIs of enlargement countries and Eurostat in order to involve them in the system. The guidance of Eurostat affects the integration process in a positive way.
Bilateral partnerships are another informal framework for cooperation between an enlargement country and a Member State with the purpose to facilitate direct communication between the two NSIs and provide a certain form of informal assistance (consultancy) to the NSI in the enlargement country. A partnership is a source of first-hand exchange of information, of experience and of consultation, both for technical aspects, but also for more horizontal issues such as management. This partnership can also be considered a preliminary preparatory stage for the NSI in the enlargement country in view of joining the ESS at a later stage.
In the context of the objective of the integration NSIs into the ESS, the expected results are:
a. Increased knowledge about the EU acquis, European statistics and their compilation methods, standards and terminologies;
b. Improved cooperation between ESS and NSIs of enlargement countries;
c. More involvement of main statistics providers (stakeholders) in national statistical systems within the ESS;
d. Established bilateral partnerships.
Indicators to measure these expected results (in line with the letters which represent the results) are:
a. (I) Number of staff trained;
a. (II) Number of Eurostat meetings attended;
a. (III) Number of traineeship programmes organized;
a. (IV) Grant reports with a summary of learned and applied knowledge;
a. (V) Assessment reports by external experts;
b. (I) Number of projects the NSI has participated in;
b. (II) Number of study visits from enlargement countries to Member States;
b. (III) Number of committees, task forces, high level meetings attended;
b. (IV) Volume of contributions/presentations of enlargement countries to conferences, meetings and statistical work (e.g. the census) in the context of ESS;
b. (I) Number of stakeholder staff attending at Eurostat meetings, trainings;
c. (I) Number of examples of bilateral partnership.
5.4 Implementing the European Statistics Code of Practice
The association and accession process triggers significant changes in enlargement countries. As a result, the role of official statistics changes considerably and the importance of trusted and impartial statistical information increases. In order to respond to this new environment, enlargement countries are faced with the urgent need to adequately restructure their national statistical systems and reorganise their institutional set-up.
Stakeholders (data providers and users) have to be made aware of the impact these changes have on their relationship with national statistical institutes.
The role of official statistics in enlargement countries needs to be based on the European Statistics Code of Practice which provides the basic principles and criteria for establishing sustainable and credible national systems of official statistics.
The strategy aims to facilitate the implementation of the European Statistics Code of Practice in the enlargement countries, thereby increasing public support through public awareness and understanding of the importance of objective, relevant, timely and accurate statistics, as well as professional independence of NSIs. It also aims to strengthen the coordinating role of NSIs in the national statistical system.
Professional independence
Professional independence is one of the focal points of implementing the European Statistics Code of Practice, and thus a key factor of the strategy. During the Light Peer Reviews and Adapted Global Assessments carried out between 2010 and 2012 in enlargement countries (except Iceland), many improvement recommendations were given regarding the professional independence of NSIs. These were mainly related to the amendment of the statistical law in the given country to regulate the appointment and dismissal of the Head of the national statistical institute, to introduce a fixed term mandate for the Head of the national statistical institute, as well as to include the right of producers of official statistics to intervene publicly on statistical issues in case of misuse or misinterpretation of official statistics. Fully implementing these recommendations is essential to achieving professional independence.
In this respect, the strategy aims to launch actions strengthening and stabilising NSIs institutional set-up, and reinforcing current management and planning systems for the entire statistical system.
Commitment to quality
An important element of the strategy is to support countries in developing and improving statistics through the set-up and implementation of a quality management framework and procedures. This also relates to Principle 4 of the Code of Practice, commitment to quality.
Statistics in a wider sense does not only consist of the production and dissemination of statistical data. Another dimension of statistics is the issue of quality, which guarantees its legitimacy, inside and outside the country of production. Quality involves continuous improvement in a world of globalisation and evolving technology. As the mission of the ESS is to provide high quality information, a systematic quality management is needed in order to identify shortcomings and implement improvements.
Quality of European statistics is not only meant in terms of providing aggregates and comparable data at European level, but includes also elements like the relevance of statistical data, accuracy of estimates, timeliness, accessibility and clarity of data, comparability, coherence and completeness. Enlargement countries should develop their own in-house system for quality reporting that will allow them to be integrated later to the quality management framework.
Due to the complexity of national statistical systems and the variety of statistical areas, extensive training in management and organisation is required. Good practices in other countries show that this training activity should also be considered as part of a quality framework.
Strengthen the role of NSIs as coordinators of the national statistical systems
The strategy aims to strengthen the coordinating role of NSIs and to launch and support actions to improve the visibility of the NSIs in enlargement countries.
NSIs have the leading role in the production and dissemination of official statistics and within the national statistical system. They are the main coordinators within the statistical system of countries and this position needs to be enforced.
This principle is in many cases laid down in the statistical law. However, its implementation is difficult as it involves many different actors and elements. Permanent changes of other actors in the statistical system and a lack of confidence in statistics make the task of coordinating the statistical system difficult. Some enlargement countries have an explicit or implicit hierarchy of state bodies. For instance, ministries are at a higher level than agencies and offices like NSIs. That may result in a lack of authority of the NSI in the national statistical system if ministries are also producers of statistical data in certain domains. Support could be envisaged in this area in terms of providing advice and benchmarking exercises.
The coordination role also involves that NSIs have an international representation function. Consequently this means that they are the official voice of the national statistical system on the international scene.
Monitoring
To measure the progress achieved in the implementation of the Code of Practice and the Strategy on Cooperation, a new round of Peer Reviews will likely be necessary in the period covered by the strategy. The new round should take place between 2015 and 2017 and should take stock of the status of the principles covering the institutional environment (principles 1 to 6 and 15) and in addition to this covering also the statistical processes and statistical outputs (i.e. principles 7 to 10 and 11 to 15). In the meantime the annual monitoring of actions related to Peer Review and Global Assessment recommendations should continue similarly to recent years.
In the context of the objective of implementing the European Statistics Code of Practice, the expected results are:
a. The professional independence of the NSI is ensured;
b. A quality management system is set up and implemented, and a quality culture is introduced in the NSI;
c. Strengthened role of NSIs as coordinators of the official statistical system;
d. Progressing implementation of the CoP.
Indicators to measure these expected results (in line with the letters which represent the results) are:
a. (I) The existence of clear rules for the appointment, dismissal and length of mandate of the Head of the NSI in the statistical law or other relevant legal acts;
a. (II) The result of assessment reports, such as Peer Reviews or Global Assessments;
b. (I) The existence of a quality management system within the NSI and reports on implementation measures;
b. (II) The existence of a quality manager or a quality unit in the NSI and regular quality reports;
c. (I) The existence of legislation that stipulates the rights of the NSI regarding the coordination of and influence over official statistics and the access, creation, improvement or discontinuation of administrative registers;
c. (II) The number of memoranda of understanding signed with other producers of official statistics;
d. (I) The results of the second round of Peer Reviews conducted in enlargement countries;
d. (II) The results of the annual monitoring on the implementation of improvement recommendations.
5.5 Strengthen the management capacity of National Statistical Institutes
A key issue to this strategy is to improve organisational capacity in order to enable NSIs to implement the statistical production requirements and to make those improvements in a lasting and progressive manner. It is common that NSIs spend about 2/3 of their appropriations on human resources and increasing the return on this investment will bring substantial benefits to organizations. There are two primary vehicles to make better use of the human resources already in place in NSIs: on one hand, increasing the managerial capacity and, on the other hand, strengthening the strategic role of Human Resources (HR).
In the past HR-related problems such as high staff turnover and frequent changes in management were recurring challenges for enlargement countries. These are problematic issues as NSIs in question are in the process of building up know-how and capacity to take on full requirements of the EU acquis and loss of human capital can seriously hamper progress. Further, for the EU requirements to be met NSIs will have to develop their own organizational structure through change management and eventually become not only fully capable of producing statistics in line with the EU acquis but also capable of fully participating as a peer in the development of European statistics. This means not only meeting the requirements of the EU acquis but also building up significant human capital in order to be able to make future contributions to the development of European statistics. NSIs will need to meet these challenges and tackle historical HR-related problems. Strengthening the strategic role of HR and formalizing a HR policy is a way forward and one that is likely to benefit NSIs in numerous ways both in the medium and long term.
Within the field of official statistics it is quite common that statisticians are promoted to managers based on their superior knowledge in a statistical area. Due to the complexities of national statistical systems such promotions may be quite logical but need a thorough backing of extensive training in managerial skills. As NSIs of enlargement countries grow towards accession they will need to rely on their middle management in particular to implement the organizational changes needed to become a fully operational EU member statistical office. To make the organization more adaptive in implementing change and making positive developments more sustainable, NSIs will therefore have to invest in people and in managers in particular. This is an investment that will result in higher efficiency in everyday running of NSIs and better use of own resources.
Strengthening the organisational capacity of NSIs is investing in their people. The human capital is the backbone of statistical production and stronger organisations will be capable of producing more and better statistics. Perhaps most importantly better organisational capacity will make improvements more permanent as more knowledge and skills are retained with the human capital. As NSIs of enlargement countries grow to take on increased responsibilities as to EU requirements they should do so in a sustainable and effective manner so that at the end of the line they will be organisations capable of full participation in the European Statistical System.
In the context of described objective, the expected results are as follows:
a. Improved Human Resource Management capacity;
b. Increased managerial capacity.
Indicators to measure these expected results (in line with the letters which represent the results) are:
a. (I) Existence of a documented and openly available human resource policy;
a. (II) 2/3 of all recruited permanent staff is retained over a three year period;
b. (I) The ratio of planned project objectives to implemented project objectives is at least 70% for all pilot projects (or other assisted projects) with deliverables;
(II) Feedback on management issues in staff satisfaction surveys is adequate, less than 30% of permanent staff rate managerial issue below average.
Instruments and costs
This section describes the instruments and means for implementing this strategy and the financial resources required from various sources such as the IPA statistical cooperation programmes (both multi-beneficiary and national IPA programmes) and other donors. The instruments described below should serve as the main tools in reaching the objectives and results defined under Chapter 5 of the strategy.
6.1 Instruments
6.1.1 Types of instruments
The following overview of instruments for statistical assistance is in general applicable to all enlargement countries:
A. Peer reviews
B. Pilot projects
C. Participation in meetings within the ESS
D. Training
E. Traineeships
F. Study visits and consultancies
The various types of activities are explained in more detail hereafter.
A. Peer reviews
This instrument is linked to Objective 5.3 Implementing the European Statistics Code of Practice and provides systematic and comprehensive assessment done by qualified experts. Peer reviews indicate problems and drawbacks and recommend solutions that ensure rapid responses to users' needs, increase the quality of statistics, improve the visibility of statistical offices and strengthen their coordinating role.
B. Pilot projects
Data collection as part of pilot projects is an important element of implementing new and existing acquis. In this respect the main purpose of pilot projects is assessments and advice from external experts, transfer of know-how and financial contributions to NSIs of enlargement countries in order to carry out statistical pilot surveys collecting data in those areas where this is required mainly by new acquis and sometimes for the existing acquis (but over a limited time period). Pilot projects may also aim at drafting methodological reports, quality reports, inventories of methodology and sources and data studies. To enhance the multi-beneficiary character of the pilot projects specific workshops may be organised where the beneficiaries can discuss project-related issues and find solutions to common problems. Pilot projects shall be implemented primarily in the priority areas defined by the strategy (Chapter 5.1), where enlargement countries need to make further efforts in implementing new statistical acquis and maintaining existing acquis.
C. Participation in meetings within the ESS
Eurostat organises approximately 250 technical meetings (working groups, committees, training courses etc.) each year covering all areas of statistics, of which around 140 are relevant for the enlargement countries. Participation in these meetings allows those involved to get acquainted with the existing acquis and with problems and solutions for its implementation, to be aware of new developments in the acquis and to provide input for the development of new acquis. Since this type of assistance proved to be extremely useful over the previous years, it is desirable to increase participation of enlargement countries in the number of meetings.
D. Statistical training
Statistics comprises many different fields. Harmonisation, need for comparability, good knowledge and information about new methods and phenomena are important for the production of good quality statistics. Therefore, training and life-long learning in statistics are vital to meet the current challenges. There are in-country training courses and regional training courses. The former courses focus on concrete and specific themes for the staff in a country. Specialists from several countries participate in the latter training courses in order to acquire state-of-the art knowledge for the production of high quality statistics. Well targeted IT training is essential for the enlargement countries for developing production and dissemination of statistics. Management training is aimed to support developing of strategies, defining a statistical infrastructure, handling user requests, implementing new initiatives and achieving the mission and the vision of NSIs. Management training should cover both top and middle management.
E. Traineeships
This is a form of training where employees from beneficiary NSIs are seconded to Eurostat or to an NSI in a Member State or an EFTA country to study more thoroughly the functioning of the European Statistical System. A traineeship usually lasts for three to five months.
F. Study visits and consultancies
Study visits and consultancies are an essential tool for enlargement countries for acquiring new knowledge. The aim of these tailor-made activities is to give an individual dimension to the multi-beneficiary approach by taking into account the specific needs of the country concerned. Study visits and consultations are an excellent opportunity for the enlargement countries’ experts to see how the practical implementation of EU acquis works. They help to establishing close bilateral contacts and future partnerships.
Training courses, study visits and traineeships also assist enlargement countries with their integration efforts into the European Statistical System (defined in Objective 5.3) as well as in strengthening the management capacity of NSIs (Objective 5.4).
6.1.2 Implementation of instruments - Grants and service contracts
The multi-beneficiary programmes are implemented via grants and service contracts. An NSI being the beneficiary of a grant takes over increased responsibility to manage the funds provided by the European Commission. This is in line with the strategy to prepare the NSIs of the enlargement countries for similar management arrangements and responsibilities after they become a member of the EU and the ESS.
Service contracts are mainly used to ensure transfer of know-how through the hiring of experts for implementing work and providing advice in specific statistical domains covered by the pilot projects and organising common workshops and training for all the enlargement countries.
The decision on whether to implement the cooperation programme via a grant to the NSI or not will be based on an assessment of the administrative capacity of each NSI and on the maturity of the NSI to take over the enlarged responsibility to manage funds from the IPA programme in a sound and appropriate manner. A NSI needs to set up an appropriate organisational structure and have necessary human resources to ensure a financially sound management of a grant.
The strategy is to continue with the multi-beneficiary approach, implemented via grants and service contracts depending on the most appropriate set-up and depending on the evolvement of NSIs administrative and management capacity to manage grants as well as on the purpose of a multi-beneficiary programme
6.2 Costs
The costs for the implementation of this strategy are born by very different sources, such as the IPA programmes but also national budgets of the countries. It needs to be mentioned that the contribution of any IPA programme is relatively marginal to the contribution of the national budget of each enlargement country and both sources are need to be able to implement this strategy. All the different sources are described below.
6.2.1 Multi-beneficiary IPA programmes
The indicative budget covers the financial resources of the annual multi-beneficiary IPA programme, intended to complement other sources of funding in each of the seven[2] enlargement countries as a whole (AL, BA, ME, MK, RS, TR, XK). The distribution of the budget by country will not be defined in the strategy, but will be determined when planning each annual statistical multi-beneficiary programme, taking into accounts the specific needs.
The annual multi-beneficiary programmes will be implemented via the most appropriate set up, taking into account the needs identified by the European Commission, the absorption capacity of the countries and their ability and capacity to deal with financial management requirements (in case of direct grants).
The estimated annual budget amounts are summarised in the table below. For the years covered by this strategy the total amount needed for IPA multi-beneficiary programmes is around 56 MEUR, for each year around 8 MEUR.
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6.2.2 National IPA programmes
National IPA programmes address the specific needs of the countries to implement the acquis in practice. They cover very country-specific actions and implementation of major statistics at national level.
6.2.3 National budgets
The main source of financing is the budget provided by the government of the respective enlargement country. However, for the countries that are in the process of adopting the acquis in statistics, it is important to obtain external financial support. After the end of the EU support, the national governments are expected to guarantee the sustainability of statistical production from their own budgets.
6.2.4 Other donors
Besides the EU, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) is the largest provider of assistance in the field of statistics in enlargement countries. Statistics Sweden implements national projects on behalf of SIDA in several enlargement countries and provides technical assistance through regional programmes.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) provides technical assistance in the field of economic statistics to the majority of enlargement countries.
EFTA has organised several seminars and trainings for enlargement countries, also in cooperation with UNECE and Eurostat.
Several other donors contribute to the development of statistics, focusing on technical assistance to Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo, or to regional projects.
6.3 Donor coordination
Donor coordination should boost aid effectiveness, efficient use of funds and foster statistical capacity building in enlargement countries. Both donors and beneficiaries have responsibilities in coordinating the different activities.
The new IPA Regulation also calls for enhanced donor coordination, as it is stated in the Explanatory Memorandum "The new instrument needs to operate more flexibly and to leverage more funds from other donors or the private sector by using innovative financing instruments, while pursuing simplification and reduction of the administrative burden linked to managing the financial assistance."
Eurostat makes efforts to coordinate the activities of various donors in the area of statistics by mean of an annual donor coordination survey. All donors active in enlargement countries are asked to report statistics-related projects to Eurostat, if possible already at the project identification stage. The report on the donor survey results is available on CIRCABC website.
Monitoring and evaluation
This chapter describes the bodies for coordination of statistical cooperation and the arrangement for monitoring of compliance and results.
7.1 Coordinating bodies
Eurostat has created two bodies for coordination of statistical cooperation with third countries. One body is the Management Group for Statistical Cooperation (MGSC) where NSIs of Member States are the main participants and enlargement countries participate as observers. In this way, the MGSC serves as the Working Group for statistical cooperation. The scope is statistical cooperation in general, including European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) and development cooperation with third countries.
The second body is the Policy Group for Statistical Cooperation (PGSC) which is composed of Directors General and Heads of international cooperation units in the NSIs of enlargement countries. The PGSC serves as the sector group for statistics.
Both MGSC and PGSC meet once a year, the MGSC in Luxembourg in spring and PGSC in one of the enlargement countries on a rotating basis, usually in autumn.
The Budva Initiative Group is a frame for regional cooperation which was launched at one of the PGSC meetings but is owned by the countries of South East Europe (including Bulgaria, Greece and Romania).
Strategic information meetings for the Directors General from the enlargement countries may be organised by Eurostat in Luxembourg once a year to provide an arena for exchange of strategic orientations, views and information.
7.2 Compliance monitoring tool
The compliance of the enlargement countries with the EU acquis in statistics is monitored in detail through the Statistical Management Information System (SMIS+) tool. Linked to this tool is the Statistical Requirements Compendium, published annually by Eurostat, which lists all EU requirements systematically according to the structure of Eurostat's work programme. In SMIS+ the experts in an enlargement country assess the compliance of their statistics with the EU acquis by a textual description. Corresponding thematic units at Eurostat then add an evaluation, which is not necessarily identical to the assessment provided by the enlargement countries. The compliance monitoring presumes that statistical data are sent to Eurostat and can be assessed by Eurostat.
In addition, Eurostat checks the inclusion of data from enlargement countries in publications of various kinds, such as the Eurostat Yearbook, Statistics in Focus, and the statistical annex to the Progress Report of each enlargement country. The Progress Reports include a brief assessment of the statistical system in a separate chapter on statistics – Chapter 18.
The Unit "Statistical Cooperation" in Eurostat focuses its work on following the developments in each enlargement country on a regular basis, including in statistics and on contributing to bilateral meetings within the Stabilisation and Association Process, such as Enhanced Permanent Dialogues or Sub-Committee Meetings on statistics. Assessments of the state-of-play in the enlargement countries will focus increasingly on the availability and quality of statistical data so as to measure compliance with the acquis on the basis of data.
7.3 Monitoring of results (evaluation)
The requirements to monitor the progress of beneficiaries of IPA are enshrined in the IPA Regulation. They focus on measuring the impact of IPA support to enlargement countries. This monitoring should be done by using measurable indicators. In the area of statistics one possible indicator is data availability in enlargement countries. Availability of statistical data means that data are produced and published. A more elaborated dimension of monitoring should focus on the following elements: partial or total alignment with EU methodology, timeliness, completeness, time series, use of latest version of classifications, etc. Such monitoring requires a more complex system of monitoring to be set-up.
Monitoring covers all progress made by the National Statistical Institutes regardless whether improvements have been financed under multi-beneficiary IPA projects, national IPA projects, by bilateral donors, or under the state budget of the country concerned. It is not feasible to separate the effects of the various interventions on the improvement of the statistical institute.
IPA II foresees two major reviews of the implementation, the first at the end of 2017 and the second at the end of 2020. The results and impact of interventions under the multi-beneficiary statistical programmes will be subject to this monitoring and recommendations from the monitoring exercises will be taken into account for the design of the annual assistance programmes. Monitoring should focus on the appropriateness of the intervention, the results achieved and on the efficiency of programme implementation.
The availability of data and compliance levels as described in Annex 1 may be monitored more frequently so as to follow-up on the progress made with the provision of statistical data.
Annex 1 Compliance
The level of compliance of the enlargement countries with the EU acquis in statistics can be estimated in various ways such as legal compliance or technical / methodological compliance, but central to the concept of compliance measurement is availability of statistical data in accordance with the frequency, timeliness, quality and formats as defined in the relevant regulation. These data need to be transmitted to Eurostat and should have been validated and thus passed an acceptance test by Eurostat. The compliance can be estimated at the level of statistical domain as contained in the European Statistical Programme 2013-2017, at the level of datasets sent to Eurostat though eDAMIS, at the level of inclusion of data in statistical publications produced by Eurostat, or at the level of data points as disseminated in the dissemination database of Eurostat “EuroBase”.
For the purpose of monitoring the results from the IPA statistical cooperation programmes in general and the achievement of the objectives as listed in Chapter 5 and particularly in Chapter 5.1 over the period 2014-2020 in particular, a base line of the compliance levels per country with the existing EU acquis in statistics at the end of 2013 needs to be established. The monitoring of compliance levels can in principle be implemented every year while more thorough reviews/evaluations take place after 3 and 7 years of implementing the IPA programmes, respectively in 2017 and 2020.
The estimation of the compliance levels is based on various sources of information and on a purposely selected list of statistical domains. The criteria for selecting the statistical domains are linked to the particular relevance for EU policy (Europe 2020 indicators and the Macro-economic Imbalance Procedure), and the importance of the statistical domain for the national statistical system as such and for policy monitoring (national accounts, labour market, environment, agriculture). The selection has been done with the best of knowledge and in agreement with the enlargement countries.
In total there are 30 statistical domains used for the estimates of compliance levels per country. Based on the estimation by the enlargement countries on their objective and timeframe of becoming compliant in each domain and Eurostat’s assessment in terms of full data availability for each statistical domain as prescribed in the relevant regulation (including the provision of back-casted data in case of significant changes in classifications and/or methodology, time series, methodological soundness and quality requirements), the year of expected compliance was translated into a degree of compliance by the cut-off dates for monitoring, including the 2013 base line. Finally, intervals were constructed around the estimated percentages in order to underline the uncertainty in any such estimate, in particular of the forecasts.
The compliance levels indicated below are estimations based on the knowledge and assessment at the time of estimating them (February 2014) and may change due to the following reasons:
- they are based on pure data availability and do not cover data quality requirements;
- they are based on the EU acquis in statistics known and applicable in February 2014 while the statistics acquis is changing on a constant basis;
- significant methodological changes such as the revision of classifications may reduce the compliance levels for a certain period of time.
It is therefore important to consider these caveats when using the compliance levels indicated below.
Albania is considered to be compliant to 12-18% at the base line. With the method of estimating the future compliance, the degree is expected to reach 20-30% by the end of 2017 and 70-80% by the end of 2020. The modest increase between 2013 and 2017 and then the very sharp increase in compliance expected between 2017 and 2020 may indicate that the method is sensitive to the input from the country. For many domains, Albania estimates to become compliant after a few years and this leads to the effect of the sharp increase expected towards the end of the decade.
It should be kept in mind that similar uncertainties may be present also for the other countries.
Bosnia and Herzegovina starts with a low level of compliance of 8-14% in 2013, expects an increase to 27-37% in 2017 and to 47-57% in 2020. The expected evolution is admittedly rather slow, but it may reflect the additional complications in this country due to the decentralised statistical system with three different statistical entities.
Iceland has already a rather high compliance level due to its membership of the European Economic Area (EEA) for 20 years. In 2013, the compliance level is estimated to be 30-36% and this is expected to increase to 80-90% in 2017 and 91-100% in 2020, to a large extent due to the implementation of an action plan that was drawn up by Statistics Iceland after the screening of the chapter on statistics in 2011.
Kosovo has currently the lowest level of compliance among the enlargement countries due to the fact that it is a relatively newly established statistical office, only 5-11% in 2013. This level is estimated to increase to 41-51% in 2017 and 60-70% in 2020, which implies that a rather fast development of the statistical production system is expected.
The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia has been candidate country for a number of years, during which time the statistical office has worked on the alignment with the EU acquis. At the end of 2013, the compliance level is estimated to be 21-27% and this is expected to increase to 57-67% by 2017 and 84-94% by 2020.
Montenegro starts with a rather low level of compliance in 2013 estimated at between 15-21%, which may be due to the fact that the Statistical Office has been independent only since some years and is very small in size. With the support of the IPA programmes it is expected to reach a level of 45-55% by 2017 and a level of 81-91% by 2020.
Serbia has, with the current method for estimating compliance, a base line compliance of 19-25%, most likely linked to the fact that due to some recent significant changes in classifications (NACE Rev 2) and methodology (ESA 2010) time series availability may be reduced. This is expected to increase fast to 67-77% by the end of 2017 and to 81-91% in 2020.
Turkey has a compliance level estimated at 23-29% in 2013. This level may increase to 60-70% by 2017 and to 85-95% by 2020. Similar caveats as mentioned for Albania should be observed for Turkey.
-----------------------
[1] Iceland is not a beneficiary country under IPA II further to the Government of Iceland's decision to put the EU accession negotiations on hold.
* This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244/1999 and
the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence.
[2] Iceland is not a beneficiary country under IPA II.
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