OECS Celebrates Caribbean Statistics Day 2011

Sean Curtis Mathurin

(OECS Secretariat, Wednesday October 12th 2011, Castries Saint Lucia) Caribbean Statistics Day will be celebrated across the region on Friday 14th October 2010, recognizing the essential role of Statistics in the development of the Caribbean Community.

To mark this year’s observance of Caribbean Statistics Day, the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) Secretariat will undertake several activities. These will include an exhibition at the OECS Secretariat, interviews, publication of the forth issue of the bi-annual Newsletter “Stats in Focus”, and collaboration with St. Lucia’s Statistics Department aimed at enhancing advocacy.

The rationale for the observance of Caribbean Statistics Day is to highlight the crucial role of statistics across a wide spectrum of activities – from daily decision-making faced by individuals, businesses, students, etc. to the planning, policy-making, analysis and research activities of governments, academia and other users. Included in these activities is the use of statistics by the media in educating and informing the population of a country on current social and economic developments. Expectations are that the observance of Caribbean Statistics Day would garner greater profile for statistics across the Caribbean Community.

Statisticians

Sean Curtis Mathurin of the OECS Secretariats says this year’s Caribbean Statistics Day comes on the heels of a successful meeting of OECS Directors of Statistics, Chief Statisticians and other stakeholders, in St. Lucia last week to discuss OECS Statistical Developments in the context of the OECS Economic Union: “At that meeting, there was a consensus among the Directors that the OECS Secretariat should play a strategic role in the design and implementation of an integrated approach to statistical development for the OECS region, including: Establishing effective coordination among the actors involved in the development of statistics in the region, through the pooling of resources and provision of mutual support; Advocacy for the greater use of official statistics in policy and decision making; Establishing institutional linkages between statistics analysis and research; and Developing a common strategic vision for statistics development in the OECS region”.

It is expected that the observance of Caribbean Statistics Day across the Caribbean region would lead to improved awareness of statistics at the national levels and across the region, highlighting of information on and insights into the process of production of statistics.,the promotion of the use of statistics in a wide variety of areas, increased credibility of the statistics produced, establishment of new partnerships in the development of statistics, greater commitment to invest resources to reposition and restructure National Statistical Offices and Statistical Units in line Ministries and agencies.