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28 November 2022, 12:00 - 13:00 Indochina Time / Bangkok | Open meeting

Stats Cafe 22/2022

The ESCAP Statistics Division and the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) co-organized the Asia-Pacific Stats Café Series on "7th International Conference on Big Data and Data Science for Official Statistics: Key takeaways and ways forward" on Monday, 28 November 2022, 12.00-13.00 hours (Bangkok time, UTC+7).

Concept

National Statistics Offices (NSOs) are facing ever-growing demands for timely and quality official data and statistics due to rapid technological developments and COVID-19. To meet these demands, NSOs are exploring other non-traditional sources of data, but at the same time, they need to maintain data quality, ethics, and privacy protection standards that align with the UN Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics. In pursuing this goal, they face several new challenges including building partnerships with private data holders, investing in new infrastructures and human resources, and updating data governance arrangements.

The UN Statistical Commission recognized the needs to address these challenges and established the UN Committee of Experts on Big Data and Data Science for Official Statistics (UN-CEBD) at its 45th session to facilitate coordinated efforts and explore innovative solutions. UN-CEBD has eight Tasks Teams including the Task Team on Big Data which is responsible for investigating the benefits and challenges of using big data for monitoring and reporting on SDGs.

UN-CEBD arranges annual International Conferences on Big Data and Data Science for Official Statistics and the latest Conference was held in Yogyakarta from 7th to 11th November 2022 with the theme of Global Challenges and the Importance of Relevant and Timely Data. Workshops on Earth Observation Data, AIS, Cell Phone Data, Data Scanner, Machine-Learning and Privacy-Preserving Techniques and UN Big Data and UN PET Lab hackathons also accompanied the main Conference.

The Conference generated insightful discussions, and this ESCAP Stats Café aimed to share the key takeaways and ways forward with relevant stakeholders in Asia and the Pacific region. The session started with opening remarks from Ms Rachael Beaven—Director of Statistics Division, ESCAP—and Mr Ronald Jansen—Assistant Director of UN Statistics Division, DESA, UNSD. Following the showcase, a video highlights activities from the Conference. Speakers from NSOs and UNFCCC who attended the Conference and UN Big Data Hackathon also shared their experiences, lessons learned, and inputs on ways forward. Lastly, the ESCAP’s big data guide on "Using big data for official statistics: Key considerations when using mobile phone data" was disseminated.


28 Nov 2022
12:00
12:08
Welcome remarks (8 mins)
  • Rachael Beaven, Director, Statistics Division, ESCAP
  • Ronald Jansen, Assistant Director, Statistics Division, DESA, UNSD
12:08
12:11
Video highlighting key activities, takeaways and ways forward from the Big Data Conference (3 mins)
12:11
12:18
Indonesia: Sharing experiences, lessons learned and inputs on ways forward (7 mins)
  • Mr. Setia Pramana, Professor, Politeknik Statistika (STIS)/BPS Statistics Indonesia
12:18
12:25
Bangladesh: Sharing experiences, lessons learned and inputs on ways forward (7 mins)
  • Mr. Chandra Shekhar Roy, Senior Maintenance Engineer-IT, Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics
12:25
12:32
Mongolia: Sharing experiences, lessons learned and inputs on ways forward (7 mins)
  • Mr. Lkhamsuren Damdinsuren, Vice Chairman, National Statistics Office of Mongolia
12:32
12:39
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change: Experience sharing on UN Big Data Hackathon (7 mins)
  • Ms. Huyen Tran, Associate Programme Officer, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
12:39
12:52
Q&A (13 mins)
12:52
12:57
Launch of the “Using big data for official statistics: Key considerations when using mobile phone data” (5 mins)
12:57
13:00
Conclusion and wrap-up (3 mins)
  • Rachael Beaven, Director, Statistics Division, ESCAP

Opening & Closing

Rachael Beaven
Rachael Beaven
Director, Statistics Division, ESCAP
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Ms Rachael Beaven has over thirty years of experience in government statistics, in particular data preparation and analysis.  She has also worked extensively with governments, multilateral agencies and the statistical community, most notably through the United Nations Statistics Division, ECA, ESCAP, World Bank and Paris21.

Ms. Beaven has provided a wide range of technical support, from improving economic and financial statistics to estimating local population using geospatial data.  She is one of the founders of the Inclusive Data Charter, launched at the 2018 High-Level Political Forum, to mobilize political commitments and to advance inclusive and disaggregated data.  Ms. Beaven also led a programme on monitoring the Sustainable Development Goals with United Nations Statistics Division and established a data science hub with the Office for National Statistics of the United Kingdom to explore use of data science, in particular geospatial as well as big data, to monitor progress.

Ms. Beaven holds Master’s degrees in Statistical Applications in Business and Government as well as Business Administration, and a Bachelor’s degree in Geography and Geology.

Welcome remarks

Ronald Jansen
Ronald Jansen
Assistant Director, Statistics Division, DESA, UNSD
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Ronald Jansen is Assistant Director of the United Nations Statistics Division in New York. He is responsible for the Division’s work on data innovation and statistical capacity management since 2018.

He joined the United Nations in June 1990 and worked for many years in the area of international trade statistics, covering trade in goods and trade in services. Over the last decade he led the initiative of the Division to better integrate international trade, business statistics and global value chain analysis.

In his current position, he supports the work of the UN Committee of Experts on Big Data and Data Science for Official Statistics, including support for the Regional Hubs for Big Data and the UN Global Platform. The platform is a collaborative environment for the global statistical community to share data, services, methods and expertise, and jointly execute data innovation projects.

His educational background is in Statistics and Psychology; he obtained a PhD in mathematical modelling of human information processing in May 1990.

Moderator

Tanja Sejersen
Tanja Sejersen
Statistician, Statistics Division, ESCAP
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Tanja Brøndsted Sejersen is a Statistician at the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), Statistics Division, where she is the focal point for the regional initiative to ‘Get Every One in the Picture’. She has been engaged with Civil Registration and Vital Statistics improvement activities in Asia-Pacific since 2013, including ensuring government commitments to the outcomes of the Ministerial Conference on Civil Registration and Vital Statistics in Asia and the Pacific in November 2014.

Before joining ESCAP, Tanja worked as a social researcher in the UK and on social policy issues in the Middle East, more specifically on improving data for evidence based policy making.

Tanja is trained as a demographer and political scientist and is particularly interested in the intersections between identity, citizenship and social exclusion and the need to improve data for better development outcomes.

Speakers

Setia Pramana
Setia Pramana
Professor, Politeknik Statistika (STIS)/BPS Statistics Indonesia
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Chandra Shekhar Roy
Chandra Shekhar Roy
Senior Maintenance Engineer-IT, Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics
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Chandra Shekhar Roy is working in the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS), the NSO of this country since 1998. At present he is working as a data curator, maintenance of official statistical data, development of shared use system, and research and development of online data analysis system.

Contributing significantly in the areas of Big data, Metadata in Data Sharing, Open data management.

Mainframe data conversion like EBCDIC to ASCII. The Official Microdata Library makes all the metadata, supporting documents and reports available in common formats such as Microsoft Word & PDF. Census & Survey Metabase (Metadata + Database) for Big data analysis. Metadata is being prepared using DDI standards, Nesstar Publisher .This is the area where Big data and Data science activities are taking place.\

  • A total of 165 Microdata sets were recovered along with Metadata.
  • A total of 50 Census microdata and
  • A total of 115 Survey microdata have been created/transformed with the help of existing COBOL programming and BBS publication.
  • A total of 159 legacy-data documentation has been prepared for BBS data portal.

Longitudinal analysis for official statistics can be made by revisiting those historical data along with present data-set.

Recently his contribution on Data collection of Population and Housing Census -2022 has been conducted using CAPI in Android. 400,000 Bangladeshi Tablet was used for collecting Census data by the local enumerators across the country. Preliminary report already been published in BBS website.

Biographer:

  • Publication of Concept Note on National Population Register(NPR) of the Bangladesh. NHD project conducted the country-wide field operations and collected household-based data linkage with National ID and Birth registration of the individuals. The database (NHD-MIS) has already been prepared. Hence, development of NPR using NHD-MIS database.
  • Three rounds of telephonic survey ‘Opinion survey on power supply’ using CATI application. Development of a real-time social change prediction system using Big data analysis.
  • Methods and Techniques of Sixth Round of the Population and Housing Census 2022 of Bangladesh.
  • Development of Metadata, Conversion and Archiving of the Time Series Data of the Completed Censuses and Surveys of the BBS-2018.

Mr. Roy also involved in Paris21s IDR project, iData Studio project, IPUMS, ANCSDAAP, APPI, ITU, OGD focal point officer in BBS. Data science community like, RDA, IASSIST, DSWS & Bangladesh Computer Society (BCS). ID # M-536,

Mr. Roy holds Master’s degrees in Computer Science and graduated in Engineering (EEE).

Lkhamsuren Damdinsuren
Lkhamsuren Damdinsuren
Vice Chairman, National Statistics Office of Mongolia
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Lkhamsuren Damdinsuren holds a PhD in Computer Science from Hokkaido University, Japan, and two Masters Degrees: Master of Information Technology from School of Information and Communication Technology, Mongolian University of Science and Technology, Mongolia, and Master of Public Administration from School of Business Administration and Humanities, Mongolian University of Science and Technology, Mongolia.

He has years of experience working in both Mongolia and Japan namely:

  • 2018-2021 Director General, Technology and Innovation Department, Mongolian People's Party
  • 2016-2018 Director General, Statistical Department of Ulaanbaatar city, The National Statistics Office
  • 2012-2016 Director General, Division of Information Technology and Innovation, State Procurement Agency-Government implementing agency
  • 2006-2012 Researcher, Meme Media Lab, Hokkaido University, Japan
  • 2003-2006 Head, Internet and Information Center Project, Mongolian University of Science and Technology
  • 2001-2003 Programmer, Program Development team, Cardia Ltd., Japan
  • 2000-2001 Specialist, Education Policy and Regulation Department, Mongolian University of Science and Technology
  • 1999-2000 Instructor, School of Information and Communication Technology, Mongolian University of Science and Technology
Huyen Tran
Huyen Tran
Associate Programme Officer, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
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Huyen (Quinn) is currently an Associate Program Officer at UN Climate Change, based in Bonn, Germany working on matters relating to Greenhouse Gas data. Previously, she has had experiences with many international organizations, including being a member of the GIS team at UNOICT/ UNDSS, a data analyst at UNOPS and IFC-World Bank Group, and a data consultant at UNESCAP. Within these organizations, she has engaged in various projects relating to ICT, data analysis, reporting and data visualization using a wide range of programming languages and tools. She was also a tax analyst at Deloitte Vietnam and had completed her Master in Economics at La Sapienza Università di Roma in Rome, Italy.

for more information, please contact

Statistics Division +66 2288 1234 [email protected]
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