Rich discussion, political commitment expected at Statistics High Level Forum
Commitment from governments of the Region to strengthen national statistics systems is one of the key outcomes of the High Level Advocacy Meeting on Statistics that will be held on Friday, 22 February 2019 in St. George’s, Grenada. The Forum will be held under the theme ‘Investing in Statistics to Build Resilience and to Achieve Sustainable Economic Growth and Development in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM)‘.
The High Level Forum, the third of its kind in the Region, is organised around the Regional Strategy for the Development of Statistics (RSDS). The overarching theme of the CARICOM RSDS is ‘Building Resilience of the Caribbean Community’. The Strategy aims at harmonising statistics in CARICOM, and improving and modernising national statistics systems. It is considered critical to the regional integration process and its measurement.
On Friday, following an opening ceremony that will feature an address by Prime Minister of Grenada, Dr. the Rt. Hon Keith Mitchell, statistics stakeholders will brainstorm how to operationalise the strategic framework of the RSDS. The focus of that first session of the Forum is getting the political commitment of Member States.
Other sessions will deal with the areas of greatest needs to transform and modernise the statistical systems and resource mobilisation for that transformation to take place.
Forum participants include Heads of Statistics Offices across the Region, CARICOM Secretariat representatives, officials from the international development partners including the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the United Nations Economic Commission on Latin America and the Caribbean (UNECLAC), UNWOMEN, and the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).
The Regional Statistics Programme of the CARICOM Secretariat, is organising the event in collaboration with the host country’s Central Statistical Office, and with support from PARIS21, the IDB and the European Development Fund Support Services Unit, Grenada.
Media Advisory
A High Level Advocacy Forum on Statistics will be held on Friday, 22 February 2019, in St. George’s, Grenada. The implementation of the Regional Strategy for the Development of Statistics (RSDS) will be the centre of discussions at the Forum.
The feature address at the opening of the one-day Forum will be delivered by Dr. Rt. Hon. Keith Mitchell, Prime Minister of Grenada, and Lead Head of Government in the CARICOM Quasi Cabinet with responsibility for Science and Technology.
Representatives of the media are invited to cover the following:
Event: Opening Ceremony, High Level Advocacy Forum on Statistics
Date: 22 February, 2019
Venue: National Trade Centre, St. George’s, Grenada
Time: 9 am
Kindly make every effort to be present at least 15 minutes before the Opening Ceremony for timely coverage of this event.