DevStat selected as provider of advisory services with the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Co-operation (CTA)

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DevStat has been selected as provider of advisory services within a framework contract with the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Co-operation (CTA), a joint institution of the European Union and the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States. CTA aims at ending poverty and hunger, mitigate climate change and promote food security and growth through technical cooperation in the field of agriculture. DevStat will be requested to provide advice on the design of statistical studies, compile baseline data and prepare technical reports to support CTA activities.

 

DevStat supports Eurostat and ESCAP in the organisation of High-Level Seminar on “Policy-data nexus, experience sharing between EU countries and Asia”

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DevStat is pleased to inform of its contribution to the organisation a High-Level Seminar on “Policy-data nexus, experience sharing between EU countries and Asia” will take place in Bangkok, Thailand, 14th and 15th October. This Seminar is organized for Eurostat in close cooperation with ESCAP (Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific).

The High-Level Seminar will provide a platform for discussions on national and international practices for engaging a dialogue between policy-makers and statisticians, especially in relation to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals. Social, economic and environmental policies should be based on scientific methods to gather evidence on target populations, evaluate alternative scenarios and measuring their impact.  The seminar is expected to deliver suggestions, ideas and reflections to the ESCAP Committee on Statistics – the highest coordinating body of statistics in Asia and the Pacific- that will take place the same week.

DevStat has mobilized top-level European statistical experts for conducting lectures and discussion sessions.

During the next three years, DevStat in cooperation with our partner T&T Executive for the logistics, will support Eurostat in organizing similar conferences in Africa, Latin America and Europe.

DevStat provides since 2004 advisory services to international organisations and national governments for the improvement of public policies based on statistical evidence, improving the functioning of their National Statistical Institutes, being a regular consultant to the European Commission, the World Bank and several United Nations agencies.

DevStat contributes to the international methodology for measuring ICT skills

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José CERVERA, CEO of DevStat, attends the 6th meeting of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) Expert Group on ICT household indicators (Geneva, 15-19 October 2018), as member of the sub-group discussing how to produce statistics on ICT skills.

 Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) are changing the labour market, social relations, trade, medicine and almost every other aspect of our daily lives. The skills required for successfully adapting one’s life to the rapid changes are diverse, from finding information on-line to using new means of communication to being able to process large amounts of data. Measuring the gaps in skills is necessary to adopt ICT education policies for all, to fully benefit of the rapid evolution of technology. Statisticians from all the world discuss how to produce meaningful data on ICT skills through household surveys, in the framework of international standards for ICT statistics. For more information see http://www.itu.int/net4/ITU-D/forum/expertgrouponhouseholds/forum/ .

DevStat joins the Global Open Data for Agriculture and Nutrition Network – GODAN

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 DevStat joins the GODAN (“Global Open Data for Agriculture and Nutrition”) Network (www.godan.info), an international network of organizations aiming at promoting the dissemination and use of open data to inform policies for improving agriculture and nutrition worldwide. Through the increased access of data from public and private partners, and using statistical analysis techniques, policy-makers should be able to design and monitor better policies.

DevStat’s experience in open data includes organisation an international conference for Eurostat in 2016 on Linked Open Data presenting the methods for increasing the value of data sources through their combination, as well as the statistical analysis of hundreds of thousands of open public tender documents for the support of European trade policies.

José L. Cervera, CEO de DevStat, invited by the Vice-Premier of Ukraine to join a working group of experts to design an integrated information system

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“José L. Cervera, CEO de DevStat, was invited by the Vice-Premier of Ukraine, G. Zubko, to join a working group of experts to design an integrated information system for the Ministry of Regional Development, supporting evidence-based decisions in the areas of territorial development. The current process of amalgamation of municipalities in Ukraine, together with the decentralisation of certain competences, together with the preparation of the next State Strategy for Regional Development after 2020 require collecting, processing and disseminating relevant statistical indicators and geospatial information”.

Survey on access and use of ICT by households and individuals in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

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The first survey on access and use of ICT by households and individuals in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has been recently published, referring to 2017.
DevStat provided technical assistance to the Statistical Office of Saudi Arabia, to design the survey according to the standards of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) manual, of which the 2nd edition was prepared by José Cervera, CEO of DevStat, in 2014 (https://www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-d/opb/ind/D-IND-ITCMEAS-2014-PDF-E.pdf). The survey interviewed 24.000 households and shows that the Kingdom’s population has access to Internet in a similar proportion than European countries (76% to 94% depending on regions), with a significant difference between Saudis and non-Saudis, and between men and women. As in many quickly developing countries, the connection is more frequent through smartphones. DevStat’s work on ICT indicators has reached a global level, having provided technical assistance to Ethiopia, China, Kazakhstan, Oman, Qatar, as well as in regional trainings in French speaking African countries, English speaking Caribbean countries, Latin America and the Arab region.

DevStat sponsored CARMA 2018

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Continuing with the collaboration with the Polytechnic University of Valencia, DevStat sponsored the 2nd International Conference on Advanced Research Methods and Analytics (CARMA 2018) organized under the technical leaderships of Prof. Josep Domenech and Prof. M.R. Vicente. Our contribution including chairing the session on Economic Indicators, where machine-learning and Big Data-based analytical methods were applied to the production of indicators on  business innovation, entrepreneurial activity,  consumer expenditure and macroeconomic indicators. The papers showed the potential of new sources to complement Official Statistics.

DevStat also facilitated the presence of speaker Mr Afshin Asofteh of Univ. Lisbon who presented a communication on the use of Big Data analytics in central banks. Proceedings of the CARMA 2018 are available here: http://ocs.editorial.upv.es/index.php/CARMA/CARMA2018/paper/viewFile/8742/4339

First survey on the use of ICT by households and individuals for GASTAT

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DevStat has prepared for the General Statistics Authority of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (GASTAT) the first survey on the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) by households and individuals, and provided methodological advice on the same topic for the business sector. DevStat consultants promoted the use of international standards, such as those of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), for the design the the survey and the calculation of indicators. The survey will provide relevant information for the government of the Kingdom to continue its plans for modernising the country, within the Vision 2030, which aims at increasing the ICT infrastructure, e-government and use.

ICT statistics is one of the strong areas of expertise of DevStat, having implemented training programmes and consultancies in the Arab countries, Kazakhstan, Ethiopia and China.  

DevStat participates at the Working Group on Quality (Eurostat), Luxembourg 15 June 2018

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The consortium DevStat-Statistics Norway presented, at the Quality Working Group meeting (Luxembourg, 15 June 2018), the final results of the project on “Development of conceptual elements for a common quality framework in the European Statistical System (ESS)”. The results of the project, which consist of a set of proposals on core values, principles and a model for an Enhanced Common Quality Framework in the European Statistical System, were discussed with the representatives of the statistical institutes in the EU Member States and candidate countries. The recommendations are intended to guide the further development of the quality work in the ESS, having as central part the Code of Practice for European statistics.

On behalf of Devstat, the project has been managed by Florabela Carausu. Technical coordination was ensured by Hans Viggo Sæbø and Michael Colledge, and specific expertise in risk management was ensured by Fabrizio Rotundi and Federico Ceschel.

DevStat participates at SCORUS2018 Conference

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DevStat participates at the SCORUS 2018 Conference held in Warsaw (Poland) on 6-8 June with a communication on “Technical assistance in regional statistics to transition and developing countries: lessons learnt from users and producers” prepared by Jose Cervera (CEO) and Florabela Carausu (Consultant).

SCORUS (Standing Committee on Regional and Urban Statistics) is the international network for regional and urban statistics providing a platform to facilitate the development of urban and regional statistics and research, a committee of the International Association of Official Statistics (IAOS).

Under the topic “New scale – New needs – New statistics” SCORUS2018 brings once again on the discussion agenda most recent developments and challenges for regional and urban statistics.

The objective of DevStat’s communication was to present to the community of SCORUS a particular aspect of the activity in statistics, that is technical assistance. Through this new contribution to an international conference, DevStat strengthens its role as facilitator of the dialogue between diverse stakeholders of (official) statistics and reconfirms the active participation in policy and research activities.