After 38 years of serving the nation, National Statistical Office (NSO), the country’s first female commissioner of statistics Mercy Kanyuka has bowed out. While at the helm of NSO, she championed the undertaking of integrated household surveys (IHS), demographic health survey (DHS), multiple indicator cluster survey (Mics), annual economic survey (AES), consumer price indices (CPI) and production indices, among others. Our Reporter STEVE CHILUNDU caught up with her to share her experiences, opportunities and challenges:

Kanyuka: Consider more support towards statistical development

How has been your work at NSO? What state are you leaving the institution in?

I was the seventh and first female commissioner in the history of NSO. A stint of 38 years in service, my work was exciting and challenging on sustainability of periodic surveys such as IHS, DHS, Mics, AES, CPI, production indices, etc.

Under my administration, we increased resource mobilisation, got more support from development partners, improved the visibility and profile of NSO on the continental and global scene and I was elected Paris21 board member. I also spearheaded a functional review which raised the rank of the headship of NSO to principal secretary and other management positions.

I also championed discussions on autonomy of NSO, which also brings along modernisation of the office. It also improves the trust and confidence in statistical products by users. NSO’s autonomy has the support of top leadership in the country, including Parliament and development partners. They all say it should have happened yesterday;

I also spearheaded the revision of statistical legislation to be in line with a semi-autonomous NSO, this is work in progress.

What challenges have you faced over the years in generating and managing the country’s statistics?

Mushrooming of data producers, some without sound methodologies on surveys, has led to difficulties in managing the Malawi statistical system.

We also have data producers not adhering to the National Statistics Act 2013 before they engage in national-scale statistical undertakings.

Another challenge has been inability to fully exploit Big Data due to contractual requirements predominantly with the private sector.

Again, lack of adequate support to generate real-time statistics, such as Covid-19 statistics and the impact of floods and inadequate financial resources to undertake censuses and surveys as planned and lack of experienced technical personnel.

What has been the cause of controversies around national accounts such as gross domestic product (GDP) and inflation figures? This question comes in relation to IMF, World Bank and African Development Bank, who comes up with their own GDP estimates, how can this be addressed to ensure unified GDP figures?

Unification of figures will be achieved only when they adopt our numbers. We go out to collect data and do analyses. They do not. We use international guidelines in computing our statistics and they have trained us in statistical methodologies over the years. We are using the same technical know-how to generate the statistics that we disseminate!

How should the NSO be structured better to make meaningful contribution to national planning and implementation?

Semi-autonomy status has to come to fruition. There is need to accelerate technological advancement in data collection and processing, including efficient online dissemination channels and acknowledgement of NSO as a lead institution in census and survey designs.

We also need to explore enhanced use of administrative data to reduce expenditures on censuses and surveys wherever this is possible.

What does the autonomy mean to NSO?

It will have a board of directors reporting to Parliament, an associated ministry in government, able to hire, incentivise and therefore retain while receiving funding from government as is the practice elsewhere.

The censuses and surveys are very expensive,  there is no autonomous statistical agency in the world that does not depend on government for financial resource.

The autonomy will also help improve the perception of, as well as trust and confidence in statistical products to help in predictability of funding and ring-fencing of financial resources as well as improve  operational efficiency and effectiveness in generating statistical data and some kind of independence.

How important is the NSO to the country’s development?

Malawi2063 and Sustainable Development Goals are depending on NSO largely to provide the bulk of statistical data for monitoring its implementation in the very long-term, and the implementation of MIP-1 in the medium-term. Without NSO and without statistical data, any policies formulated would be redundant;

If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it!

What are your parting words as you gracefully retire from the NSO?

I achieved satisfaction from working with numbers all these years, no regrets! The populace must take an interest in data and statistics. The media must take up the role of educating people from all spheres of life the role of statistics and its importance.

Government, the private sector and development partners should consider more support towards statistical development to all producers and therefore ensure that we have all the data we need to measure development progress in all spheres of life.

Open to offer advice on statistical matters when called upon. n

This interview was first published in Business Review on March 31 2022. However, it was published with a wrong picture. Above is the correct picture—Editor

The post Take an interest in statistical data-Kanyuka appeared first on The Nation Online.