The Ghana Statistical Service has launched a 5-year Corporate Plan for 2020 to 2024, to ensure efficient collection, production, management and dissemination of quality official statistics and data required for the development of relevant national policies.
According to the Ghana Statistical Service, the goal is to ensure that all results are produced to meet international standards to aid in good governance.
It also seeks to provide the trust, transparency and integrity that society will demand for government to invest for the true measurement of national development and things that matter to the citizens.
In an interview with Citi Business News, Government Statistician, Prof. Samuel Kobina Annim, said the plan will boost the Service’s image in terms of data collection.
“We need the GSS to be the trusted provider of official statistics for good governance. What that means is that now we will put emphasis on not any statistics; but on official statistics, and this is where we draw the line between statistics, trust and consolidating the democracy that we have in our country. So what we are saying is that if we want people to have better lives, two things must occur; having better statistics and better decisions based on the statistics that we have generated. That is the only way we can consolidate our democracy and we can have better lives” he said.
The GSS says it will be guided by the corporate plan within the next five years in implementing its five critical objectives.
If it is implemented efficiently, leveraging the new Statistics Service Act will mean that GSS will be able to produce more timely and cost-effective statistical information for its data Users to track national development.
The GSS is working together with the Statistics Denmark on the strategy to improve the collection and use of Administrative data.
The Corporate Plan is a transparent commitment to its data users and citizens on how it intends to collect and produce quality statistics for national development.
Director of Administration at Statistics Denmark, Carsten Zangenberg, spoke about the partnership with GSS.
President of the International Association for Official Statistics, John Pullinger, is positive the plan will push Ghana to achieve its developmental goals.
by Jessica Ayorkor Aryee
