Working Group of Statistical
Experts, 11th Session
Bangkok, 23-26 November
1999
Overview of Significant
Global and Regional Issues in Official Statistics
Summary
This paper is intended to
provide he Working Group with a review of
statistical developments in a range of fields
concerning official statistics. The review
is organized along subject-matter lines.
Information from recent sessions of the
Economic and Social Council, the ACC Subcommittee
on Statistical Activities, tthe United Nations
Statistical Commission (UNSC) and the Economic
and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific
(ESCAP) is presented. Recent activities
of the so-called city groups are also reported
in so far as information is available
This paper aims to report
significant events in the field of official
statistics that have arisen at global and
regional level during the last year. Outcomes
covered are primarily from the most recent
sessions of the Economic and Social Council,
the Administrative Committee on Coordination
Subcommittee on Statistical Activities (ACCSA),
the United Nations Statistical Commission
(UNSC) and the annual session of the Economic
and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific1/.
This paper is structured along subject-matter
lines: similarly to documents prepared for
other meetings, like the last session of the
Committee on Statistics, similar issues discussed
by one or more meetings are dealt with in
each section. An attempt to summarize the
topics reported has been made. Following a
practice that was considered useful, information
on the activities of the city groups, as available
to the secretariat in October 1999, is also
reported. A list of the city and similar groups
is given in Annex I and short descriptions
are available at the UNSD Web site. In Annex
II, the draft provisional agenda of the next
session of the UNSC is provided. When certain
topics are dealt with in other papers, a reference
to the document is given.
1/
Hereinafter referred as the "Commission"
The United Nations Statistical
Commission held its thirtieth session in New
York from 1 to 5 March 1999.
The Economic and Social
Commission for Asia and the Pacific held its
fifty-fifth session from 22 to 28 April 1999
in Bangkok.
The Economic and Social
Council held a special informal session on
10-11 May 1999 in New York. It met to be briefed
on basic indicators before the beginning of
more general discussions under the agenda
item on "Integrated and coordinated implementation
of and follow-up to major United Nations Conferences
and Summits", which took place at the main
substantive session of Economic and Social
Council that was held in Geneva in July 1999.
The topic of development indicators will be
discussed under item 8 of the Working Group's
provisional agenda.
The ACC Subcommittee
on Statistical Activities held its thirty-third
session in Madrid from 14 to 16 September
1999.
City groups refer to
informal discussion groups, formed primarily
by representatives of national statistical
offices, that have been established to deal
with specific themes in the field of statistics.
While some city groups have been more active
than others, their work especially in developing
international statistical standards is becoming
more closely integrated with that of the main
global statistical actors. A report on the
work of the city groups was presented to the
UNSC in March 1999. Unfortunately, in the
course of preparation of this paper, the secretariat
found very little up-to-date information on
the various Web sites of the city groups,
and thus has difficulty in providing the Working
Group with details of their current activities.
The provisional agenda
of this session of the Working Group focuses
on particular topics including the 2000 round
of censuses and population statistics, poverty
measurement and statistics, gender statistics,
and development indicators. As these topics
will be discussed on the basis of more specific
papers under the appropriate agenda items,
the Working Group may wish to concentrate
the current discussion on other subjects discussed
in this paper.
Matters
affecting the work of the Statistical Commission
and the Working Group on International Statistical
Programmes
The Statistical Commission
is one of a number of functional commissions
of the Economic and Social Council. At its
main 1999 session, the Commission recommended
to the Council that sessions of the Statistical
Commission be held annually, rather than biennially,
and that the Working Group on International
Statistical Programmes and Coordination be
discontinued. This recommendation was motivated
by the need to provide for more continuity
in the Statistical Commission's decision making
and oversight of the global statistical process.
The Council in its substantive session of
July 1999 adopted a resolution to this effect.
The thirty-first session of the Statistical
Commission will accordingly be held in the
year 2000, from 29 February to 3 March in
New York.
National
accounts
As far as the 1993 System
of National Accounts (SNA) is concerned, the
Commission approved the proposal for an updating
mechanism as proposed by the Task Force on
National Accounts, with a change concerning
the period within which the members of the
Statistical Commission may approve amendments
of the type "interpretation" or "change".
The Statistical Commission lengthened this
period from 30 to 60 days. It agreed in principle
on proposed amendments referring to the treatment
of financial derivatives but asked the Intersecretariat
Working Group on National Accounts (ISWGNA)
to consider comments by member states on the
subject. The secretariat was asked to expand
the analytical portion of the future milestones
assessments on national accounts, highlighting
reasons for the progress, or weaknesses, of
countries in this subject. Activities undertaken
by the UNSD and the regional commissions should
be part of the future assessments. The ISWGNA
was also asked to monitor, and if necessary
to adjust, its work programme in order to
better meet the needs of the countries.
The 1993 SNA is one
of the top priority areas identified by the
Committee on Statistics and this priority
has been endorsed by the Commission. The Commission
expressed appreciation of the assistance provided
by the secretariat in the implementation of
the 1993 SNA and noted that although countries
in the region might have adequate knowledge
at conceptual and theoretical levels, very
frequently they lacked practical skills in
actual compilation. It suggested that further
international cooperation was needed in the
implementation of the 1993 SNA. The Commission
asked the secretariat to continue providing
support in the compilation of national accounts
including regional and subregional accounts,
evaluation of household unpaid work and the
contribution of the informal sector. It suggested
that the compilation of social accounting
matrices, input-output tables and quarterly
national accounts were among the topics that
could be covered in regional workshops. The
secretariat has already initiated a project
dealing with the measurement of unpaid work
(see STAT/WGSE.11/10) and is considering a
project proposal in the national accounts
area.
International
trade statistic
Both the Statistical
Commission and the ACC Subcommittee on Statistical
Activities agreed that the treatment of electronic
commerce (e-commerce) needed to be clarified.
It was noted that the growth in electronic
commerce posed several challenges to national
and international statistical agencies. Relevant
concepts, definitions, standards and data
collection methods for this new form of trade
need to be studied. In this connection the
Singapore Department of Statistics, in collaboration
with the Australian Bureau of Statistics and
the Berkeley Roundtable on the International
Economy, University of California, Berkeley,
will convene an ISI Cutting Edge Conference
on the subject. The meeting, "Conference on
the Measurement of Electronic Commerce"2/,
will be held from 6 to 8 December 1999 in
Singapore. UNSD will report to the Statistical
Commission at its 2000 session on the outcomes
of the Conference.
The Statistical Commission
endorsed the proposed work of UNSD on the
manual for international trade statistics
and requested that special attention be given
to the measurement of adjustments to customs
statistics for balance-of-payments purposes.
It discussed about the Commodity Trade Statistics
Database (COMTRADE) and plans for its rationalization,
encouraged countries to provide their detailed
trade data to UNSD, and endorsed the efforts
of UNSD, the Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development (OECD) and Eurostat to rationalize
their data collection, processing and storage
activities in order to reduce reporting burdens
on countries and increase the comparability
of their databases.
Services,
finance and other economic statistics
The Statistical Commission
took note of the expected availability, during
1999 and 2000, of the Manual of statistics
of international trade in services, the
Manual on Monetary and Financial Statistics
and the Manual on Government Finance Statistics.
As far as the compilation of statistics on
external debt is concerned, it also took note
of the concerns of countries about the complexities
and high-resource-intensiveness of measuring
external debt. In this context it noted the
ongoing efforts to compare alternative methods
of measuring external debt and the evaluation
of their respective advantages and disadvantages.
Members of the Task Force on Finance Statistics
will inform the regional commissions on planned
technical assistance activities in the field
of external debt statistics.
At its Madrid session,
the ACC Subcommittee on Statistical Activities
noted the efforts of the World Tourism Organization
(WTO), Eurostat and OECD to develop a common
conceptual framework for Tourism Satellite
Accounts. Their objective is to present the
framework to the next session of the Statistical
Commission.
The
International Comparison Programme (ICP)
The Statistical Commission
discussed the ICP based on reports analysing
its status, its administrative and financial
drawbacks and its effectiveness. Reports were
prepared by an external consultant, on behalf
of the United Nations, the World Bank and
IMF, and by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
The Statistical Commission accepted that the
ICP has a number of timeliness and quality
problems and that an agenda to deal with these
and other problems was needed. As a consequence,
it was decided to form a group, composed of
the World Bank, IMF and the UNSD, in order
to prepare an implementation plan for taking
practical steps to solve the highlighted problems.
The group will report on the progress made
at the next session of the Statistical Commission
in 2000.
The ACCSA expressed
concerns about the quality of the data in
the World Bank database, given the lack of
new PPP surveys in many countries.
Informal
sector statistics
The Expert Group on
Informal Sector Statistics, known as the Delhi
group, held its third meeting from 17 to 19
May 1999 in New Delhi. The meeting primarily
discussed the following three topics: clarification
and operationalization of the criteria of
informal sector definition adopted at the
fifteenth International Conference of Labour
Statisticians; development of strategies to
address sample frame and weighting issues
in informal sector surveys; and development
of an appropriate methodology for more accurate
measures of value added from the informal
sector. At the meeting it was recognized that
since the informal sector manifests itself
in different ways in different countries,
national definitions of the informal sector
cannot be fully harmonized at present. However,
a number of recommendations were issued on
the dissemination of data on the informal
sector, requesting countries to provide figures
in their national accounts and employment
statistics disaggregated by certain variables
(like the size limit of the enterprises, enterprise
registration, inclusion/exclusion of agricultural
activities, outworkers/home-workers, urban/rural
areas, and so forth) in order to enhance international
comparability of informal sector statistics.
The next meeting of the Delhi Group is tentatively
scheduled to be held during the summer of
2000, with a focus on the results of the informal
sector surveys conducted by different countries
and on investigation and development of an
appropriate methodology for more accurate
measures of value added.
Data
Dissemination Standards
Both the Statistical
Commission and ESCAP made comments in their
last sessions on the Special Data Dissemination
Standard (SDDS) and the General Data Dissemination
System (GDDS) of the IMF. In general terms,
despite the acknowledgement that SDDS and
GDDS incorporated positive elements contributing
towards the production of quality statistics,
the demand for more flexibility in SDDS was
expressed by many countries. In particular,
concern was left about the proposed extension
of SDDS in the area of external debt statistics,
and on the risk that implementing SDDS might
cause developing countries to divert scarce
resources from country-specific priority areas.
Moreover, the Statistical Commission was not
satisfied with the existing consultation processes
in relation to the SDDS. These comments were
noted by the IMF representative who indicated
that efforts would be made to enhance the
consultation process.
Demographic,
social and migration statistics
The Statistical Commission
considered topics arising in this topic mainly
from the contributions of two groups, the
Expert Group on Draft Principles and Recommendations
for a Vital Statistics System and the Siena
Group for Social Statistics. The Statistical
Commission commented positively on the work
carried out by the Expert Group on the Draft
Principles and Recommendations for a Vital
Statistics System, endorsed its recommendations,
took note of problems, and requested the secretariat
to publish the principles and recommendations
as quickly as possible in all the official
languages of the United Nations. Subsequently,
UNSD and ESCAP organized a "Training workshop
for trainers on civil registration and vital
statistics" in Bangkok in September 1999.
At regional level, recognizing
the need to strengthen census-taking capacities
in ESCAP countries, the Commission urged UNFPA
to increase its level of funding for the coming
census decade. Several countries reported
their plans and the preparatory steps taken
for conducting population and housing censuses,
and identified their technical assistance
and human resources development needs. In
that regard, the sharing of experience, particularly
that based on best practices, was considered
useful. Considering the potential of the secretariat
for assisting countries in their efforts to
improve demographic statistics, especially
with regard to the 2000 round of population
censuses, the Commission recommended that
suitable technical meetings, including those
of subregional working groups, should be organized.
It emphasized that SIAP and the Statistics
Division of ESCAP should collaborate in organizing
relevant training activities.
The ACCSA noted concerns
expressed by several agencies about conflicts
between population estimates provided by some
countries and those being produced by the
United Nations Population Division. It also
noted the intention of the World Health Organization
to develop its own estimates of adult mortality,
raising the potential that two sets of estimates
might exist in future, and thus putting at
risk the continuing availability of a unique
United Nations set of population estimates.
The ACCSA requested the involved agencies
to raise their technical questions with the
United Nations Population Division and also
requested the ACC Subcommittee on Demographic
Estimates and Projections (SCDEP), which ESCAP
currently chairs, to address the coordination
issues involved.
To be noted in the field
of demographic and population statistics is
the recent workshop organized by the secretariat
under a UNFPA-funded project, on Application
of New Technology to Population Data, which
will be taken up under item 5 (document STAT/WGSE.11/5).
Other related documents are STAT/WGSE.11/2
on regional developments in population and
housing censuses, and STAT/WGSE.11/3 and STAT/WGSE.11/4,
invited papers on the status of the 2000 round
of censuses in the Pacific subregion and on
population registers, respectively.
Environment
statistics
Under this topic, the
Statistical Commission approved the work programme
of the UNSD and welcomed the continued work
of the London Group on Environmental Accounting.
It decided, as suggested by the ACC Subcommittee
on Statistical Activities, that the Task Force
on Environment Statistics be discontinued
and that the coordination work in environment
statistics be done by the ACC Subcommittee
itself to the extent possible. As part of
its new coordination responsibilities, the
ACCSA noted the work of UNSD, its data collection
activities and the development of a manual
on environment statistics and indicators,
which will draw in part on work done at ESCAP
on the Operational Handbook on Environment
Statistics. UNSD will evaluate the country
responses to its data collection activities
in environment statistics and report on them
to the next session of the ACCSA.
At regional level, the
Commission felt that the secretariat should
take a leading role in improving environment
statistics, including through a case-study
approach, and urged donors to continue their
assistance to the (Netherlands-funded) project
in that field involving subregional workshops.
Environment statistics was one of the priority
areas identified by the Commission and one
of the subjects suggested for SIAP training
activities directed to NSOs.
Statistical
implications of recent major United Nations
conferences
The Statistical Commission
recognized this topic and the subject of poverty
statistics as being of the utmost importance.
The Statistical Commission recognized the
validity of the work on the UNSD in the trial
compilation of the Minimum National Social
Data Set (MNSDS), which was considered a useful
set providing guidance to countries interested
in developing a basic social statistics system,
and also its work on the inventory of development
indicators. The topic of development indicators
is on the agenda of the Working Group which
will have two papers on the topic before it,
STAT/WGSE.11/13 and /14. The Statistical Commission
also noted the contributions made by the Rio
Group on Poverty Statistics and requested
the Group to continue its activities, with
the invitation to concentrate its work on
relations between poverty and social exclusion
and the effect of public services on poverty
alleviation. The progresses made in national
data-collection programmes and the activities
at regional level were also noted.
Given the resurgence
of poverty incidence resulting from the financial
crisis that hit the ESCAP region since July
1997 and the continued need to enhance quantitative
knowledge on gender disparities, the discussions
on poverty and gender statistics were prominent
at the Commission session. The Commission
noted that the formulation of appropriate
poverty alleviation programmes in countries
of the region was to a large extent hampered
by inadequate understanding of the poverty
phenomenon, and of its causes and consequences.
It therefore emphasized the need for cogent
measures on estimation of poverty on a uniform
basis, and for the development of indicators
for assessing and monitoring the poverty situation
at the regional, national and subnational
levels. In this context, the Commission welcomed
the initiative taken by the secretariat to
organize the regional seminar on poverty statistics
in June 1999, and expressed the hope that
sustained efforts would be made by the secretariat
and donors in the field of poverty measurement.
The Working Group will be discussing poverty
statistics under item 6 of its provisional
agenda, for which several documents are being
prepared (STAT/WGSE.11/6, /7, /8 and /9).
In underscoring the
importance of gender statistics, the Commission
commended the secretariat for implementing
projects on improving gender statistics in
the ESCAP region, which included the preparation
and publication of statistical profiles on
the situation of women in 16 countries of
the region, and statistical booklets on women
and men for 6 selected countries. The Commission
noted that those profiles and booklets had
been helpful in providing a clear understanding
of the important gender-related issues and
problems. Gender statistics is another topic
on the Working Group's agenda (documents STAT/WGSE.11/10,
/11 and /12 refer).
International
economic and social classifications
In the field of international
classifications, the Statistical Commission
took note of the work made by the Voorburg
Group on Service Statistics and recommended
that its future work be focused on problems
of service product prices. It also endorsed
work programmes in this area by the Expert
Group on International Economic and Social
Classifications, inviting the Group to improve
the supporting materials for the International
Standard Industrial Classification of All
Economic Activities (ISIC) and the implementation,
assessment and future revisions of ISIC and
the Central Product Classification Revision
1.0 (CPC Rev.1.0). The Statistical Commission
recommended that the Expert Group on International
Economic and Social Classifications be the
central coordinating body for implementing
the work programme in the field of classifications.
A workshop on classifications was recently
held in Canberra from 27 September to 1 October.
The report of that workshop is presented with
the document STAT/WGSE.11/15.
The Statistical Commission
approved publication of the draft classifications
of expenditure according to purpose (PROV/ST/ESA/ST/AT/SER.M/84)
in the 1993 SNA. It also recognized the need
to continue to have international trade statistics
analysed according to the Standard International
Trade Classification (SITC). Furthermore,
it was planned to evaluate the usefulness
and applicability of trade statistics according
to the Central Product Classification (CPC).
UNSD will produce a data set of merchandise
trade statistics according to CPC aggregates
for review and evaluation.
Detailed information
on issues related to international economic
and social classifications can be found at
the classifications Web site of the UNSD,
at the URL http://www.un.org/Depts/unsd/class/class1.htm.
In general, those international classifications
that are registered at the United Nations
Inventory of Classifications are described
at that Web site. Any registered international
classification has its own custodian, responsible
for its maintenance, updating and revision.
The roles of custodians are explicitly stated.
There may be reference, derived and related
classifications. Reference classifications
are those economic and social classifications
that are a product of international agreements
approved by the UNSC or another competent
international body. Derived classifications
are based on reference classifications but
may add more detailed categories and are often
used at national or multinational level. Related
classifications are those that partially refer
to reference classifications or use only specific
parts of them.
Technical
Cooperation; Fundamental Principles of Official
Statistics
The Statistical Commission
discussed these topics considering, among
others, statements made by two regional commissions,
namely ESCAP and ECLAC. The ESCAP Committee
on Statistics had discussed both these topics
at its eleventh session in 1998, in order
to contribute to the debate at the Statistical
Commission. The Commission endorsed the guiding
principles for good practices in technical
cooperation for statistics, renaming them
"practical guidelines for good practices in
technical cooperation for statistics". It
agreed to their wide dissemination and to
their review after two or three years. With
regard to the Fundamental Principles of Official
Statistics, the Statistical Commission welcomed
the work of the Prague Group on Some Best
Practices for Official Statistics and the
follow-up session on best practices in statistics
held in Singapore in January 1999. It endorsed
the planned production of a document to improve
the understanding of the Principles, to promote
awareness of the Principles themselves and
to serve as a further guide in their implementation.
The establishment of a Web site by UNSD to
feature such a document was endorsed by the
Statistical Commission which also requested
UNSD to prepare a revision of its handbook
on statistical organization.
The ESCAP Commission
noted with interest that the Committee on
Statistics had discussed the set of guiding
principles for technical cooperation in statistics.
These were considered a useful beginning in
systematizing the process of providing different
groups of countries, including economies in
transition, with technical assistance, and
in rationalizing the utilization of the financial
resources allocated for technical assistance
activities. The Commission appreciated the
value of the technical cooperation activities
undertaken by the secretariat, including regional
advisory services, workshops and seminars.
While existing modalities of technical cooperation
were considered valid, there was a need to
take shifting priorities and requirements
into account. Technical cooperation among
NSOs was thought to be an efficient tool for
meeting the challenge of providing more data
with decreasing resources.
The
Year 2000 problem and other information technology
issues
The Commission noted
that the adoption of information technology
tailored to particular country needs and office
environments was an effective way to improve
national statistical capabilities. It appreciated
the increased emphasis that the secretariat
had placed on organizing group training and
expert group activities to accelerate the
adoption of information technology in national
statistical offices.
The Commission noted
that awareness about the year 2000 (Y2K) problem
had grown significantly in the region and
that the secretariat's activities, particularly
the Workshop on the Year 2000 Problem in Computers
and Strategic Issues for National Statistical
Offices, organized jointly by ESCAP and SIAP
at Bangkok in June 1998, had contributed effectively
to that improvement. It further noted that
many governments had launched vigorous government-wide
remediation efforts, enforced by legislation
and monitored regularly and frequently by
high-level lead agencies. The Commission reiterated
the recommendations of the Committee on Statistics
and urged countries to maintain a high level
of awareness and persist with remediation
action during the remaining months of the
century. The Commission approved a resolution
(55/3: "Strengthening the cooperation and
support of nations in the Asian and Pacific
region in addressing the year 2000 problem")
on the Year 2000 problem. Document STAT/WGSE.11/16
briefly covers its implementation status and
the status of preparedness in the region.
Statistical
programmes and other matters
As indicated earlier,
the decision that the Statistical Commission
will henceforth meet annually means that the
Working Group on International Statistical
Programmes and Coordination will not hold
its planned twentieth meeting in 2000 and
will be discontinued. On other programme-related
matters, the Statistical Commission decided
to explore new approaches to its operation,
for example through:
Presenting an integrated
programme of methodological development
in statistics for discussion by the Statistical
Commission
Enhancing the role
of its Bureau;
Promoting the inclusiveness
of countries in its work through an "international
cyber platform";
Further improving
the focus of documentation for its meetings;
and
Considering modalities
for enhancing the involvement of important
international users.
The first item above, the proposed "Global
integrated presentation of the work of the international
organizations in statistical methodology", is
a project based upon preparation of a database
and a Web site, to be updated annually, by the
UNSD. This issue was discussed by the ACCSA
which recognized that several questions, for
example on coverage of subjects, remained to
be refined. It was recommended that coordination
with the bureau of the Conference of European
Statisticians be established on similar activities
carried out by the Conference on their integrated
programme presentation.
The Statistical Commission
welcomed the proposal made by UNESCO on the
establishment of a semi-autonomous Institute
for Statistics, welcoming also the broad nature
of its mandate and its other features. It
emphasized that the Institute and agencies
doing related work should collaborate among
themselves. The statutes of the Institute
and its governing board are scheduled to be
formally adopted in October 1999 by the UNESCO
General Conference.
The ACCSA noted progresses
in the dissemination of statistical data in
various electronic formats (on-line, diskettes,
CD-ROMs and through Internet Web sites). The
issue of pricing such products was raised
and the Subcommittee noted the difficulties
in establishing policies for this type of
dissemination. This matter will be further
discussed at the next session of the ACCSA.
As the Subcommittee requested its member organizations
including ESCAP to prepare notes on their
policies, members of the Working Group of
Statistical Experts are invited to contribute
their inputs and proposals on desirable policies.
Other issues to be tackled in the electronic
dissemination of statistical data are the
volume of data offered free, the attribution
to original data sources and the preservation
of metadata.
The ACCSA adopted the
draft revised classification of statistics
and statistical activities and decided to
forward it to the Conference of the European
Statisticians. The Conference will be asked
to amend slightly the classification used
in its own integrated presentation of programmes,
so as to harmonize the two classifications.
Annex
I
List of City Groups
Canberra group / Household
Income Statistics
Mr. McLennan
Australian Statistician
Australian Bureau of Statistics
P.O.Box 10
Belconnen A.C.T. 2616
Australia
Siena group / Social Statistics
and Social Monitoring
Mr. Garonna
Director General
Instituto Nazionale di Statistica
Via Cesare Balbo 16, 00100 Roma, Italy
Tel. 39.6.467-32200
Fax 39.6.467-32354
For information on the fifth meeting "On the
way to a multicultural society", Neuchatel, Switzerland,
June 1997:
E-mail: Heinz.Gilomen@bfs.admin.ch
(Mr. Heinz Gilomen, Federal Statistical Office,
Switzerland)
For information on the sixth meeting "Families
in the twenty-first century", Sydney, Australia,
December 1998:
E-mail: Tim.Skinner@abs.gov.au
(Mr. Tim Skinner, ABS, Australia)
Voorburg group / Services
Statistics
Mr. Ryten, Ms. Nijhowne
Standards Division
Statistics Canada
Jean Talon Building 8 D-3
Ottawa, Canada K1A OT6
PROVISIONAL AGENDA
OF THE THIRTIETH SESSION OF THE STATISTICAL
COMMISSION3/
Election of officers
Adoption of the agenda
and other organizational matters
Economic statistics
National accounts;
International trade
statistics;
Service statistics;
Finance statistics;
Other economic statistics
Demographic, social
and migration statistics
Environment statistics
Statistical implications
of recent major United Nations conferences
Follow-up to the agreed
conclusions of the Economic and Social Council's
high-level and coordination segments, and
to its resolutions
International economic
and social classifications
Coordination and integration
of international statistical programmes
Programme questions
and related matters
Provisional agenda for
the thirty-second session of the Commission
Report of the Commission
on its thirty-first session
3/
A more detailed version of the agenda can be found
in the report of the thirtieth session of the
Statistical Commission, E/1999/24 and E/CN.3/1999/29,
available also through the Internet Web site of
the UNSD at the URL http://www.un.org/Depts/unsd/statcom/report-e.pdf
