24 February 2005
BEIRUT: In most countries with a functioning political infrastructure, statistics are the basis for the implementation of economical, social, educational and environmental policies. In an attempt to join the ranks of the international community, Lebanon is learning to re-build its databases, filling in the gaps after 20 years of civil war and chaos.
"Official statistics provide an indispensable element in the information system of a democratic society," said Education Minister Ahmed Minkara on Wednesday.
"To this end, official statistics should be compiled from every available source and then made accessible to the public by official statistical agencies," he added. "This is part of the citizens' entitlement to public information."
Minkara's comments came during a workshop titled "Basic principles of official statistics," held by the Administration of Statistics (CAS) office at Holiday Inn Dunes Hotel Beirut.
Various speakers, including Minkara and Culture Minister Naji Bustani, discussed the 10 most adopted principles in gathering and distributing economic, demographic, social and environmental data to the government, public and private sectors.
Minkara said the Cabinet has decided to reinforce CAS's work so that the state is able to make strategic decisions on productive sectors based on factual data on the ground, and not "theories."
Minkara said the center must be empowered to do the job at hand and hire local talent "before it engages on a national project and coordinates with different ministries and administrations, only to be suddenly informed that the government has decided to spend millions hiring a foreign agency to do our job."
CAS head Maral Ghidanian said official statistics are the foundation on which countries around the world base their social and economic policies.
"Applying a uniform standard on all public institutions for gathering and compiling statistical data reduces duplication problems and provide a unified result that reflects truthfulness and transparency," she said.
She said CAS is responsible for technically supervising the data that administrations hand down, as well as centralizing and coordinating the data.
CAS is also responsible for compiling the statistics, investigations and studies requested by the Council for Development and Reconstruction, and other studies requested by various other administrations.
"Information is power," Bustani said during his speech, embodying the intellectual and scientific authority needed to make the right decisions, "and official statistics represent that science if the appropriate principles are adopted to the letter."
He said ethics in gathering statistical information should apply not only to statisticians, but also to every activity related to humanitarian and social fields.
"This requires hiring a skilled [labor] force and using the latest developments in the field, while not restricting oneself to a narrow sample that does not reflect the true reality on the ground," Bustani said. He added that only then would official statistics become innocent of charges that they are skewed or in favor of one side of the equation or the other.
Statistical data already performed can be found on CAS's Web site: www.cas.gov.lb or by e-mail: center@inco.com.lb
