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STATISTICAL
CAPACITY AND DEVELOPMENT: CONCEPTS AND APPROACHES
The
problem. In Sub-Saharan Africa, the foundation of development
strategy is investment in human capital, institutions and processes
that are essential for sustained social transformation--often referred
to as "capacity building." Public Information is a principal integrating
function of any holistic program for national capacity building.
The core of this public information, in turn, is the body of statistics
that are needed to monitor, plan, and evaluate a country's socio-economic
progress. The capacity of the country's statistical office (and
of its data-gathering facilities both on the ground and throughout
the rest of the public sector), to produce, share, and disseminate
statistics of quality (relevance, reliability, and timeliness) is
therefore crucial for the success of any development strategy. Unfortunately,
throughout most of Sub-Saharan Africa during the past 20-30 years,
this statistical capacity has eroded and declined, and in the strongest
environments has failed to keep pace with growing requirements.
The Bank's response. To help its African clients deal with this
challenge, the Africa Region of the Bank has established a regional
program in Capacity Building
for Statistical Information, called CaBuSI.
CaBuSI
is leading a movment from conventional, piecemeal, technical assistance
for data production toward a more integrated method of supporting
the development of a country's public "information sector." The
concepts and approaches under consideration are discussed in the
following two documents.
How
would CaBuSI's objectives fit into the overall strategy for capacity
building that the African Governors of the Bank have proposed, in
their Partnership for Capacity Building in Africa? This broader
view is provided in "An
approach to the Implementation of Capacity Building Strategies".
Ground-level
facilities for gathering and sharing data, and for using it effectively
on the ground, are fundamental to the strength of the national statistical
system. Moreover, trends in information technology are creating
opportunities, even in poor areas, for community-based information
centers that can revolutionize statistical capacity in Africa. These
ideas are discussed in "A
Strategy for Knowledge-Based Development: Community Based Information
Lending (CIL)". Applications of these ideas can be found
in the Bank's work in India, an harbinger of things to come in Africa,
as discussed in the following two documents:
As
a knowledge-based development institution, the Bank is pursuing
statistical capacity building as one, critical key to the effective
transfer of knowledge. Kowledge-Based
Development: A New Lending Strategy for the WB puts a strategy
for statistical capacity building into the context of the Bank's
new guiding philosophy on adaptive learning for social transformation.
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