Concept Paper

SAMPLE CONCEPT PAPER

THIS PAPER HAS BEEN ALTERED FOR ILLUSTRATIVE PURPOSES AND DOES NOT REPRESENT THE ORIGINAL CONCEPT PAPER OR THE PROJECT IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM.

(i) Strengthening statistical capacity in support of progress toward the internationally agreed development goals in the Southern African Development Community region

(ii) Implementing entities and U Secretariat partners: DESA jointly with ECA

(iii) Background

Statistics are an important tool in the development-policymaking processes of countries and regional organizations. They are needed for assessing the current development situation, setting objectives and targets for the future and measuring progress and development. However, a substantial gap still exists between the demand for information and the ability of most countries in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region to routinely provide it.

The SADC Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan recognizes statistics as one of the cross-sectoral areas that need to be strengthened to foster regional cooperation and integration over the next 15 years. This project is therefore designed to improve the availability and reliability of basic data required for development planning in the SADC region, with special emphasis on data requirements for the internationally agreed development goals and the Millennium Development Goals. The project is aimed at facilitating subsequent networking among subregions through interactive sharing and management of knowledge. Furthermore, the project will strengthen links between producers and users of statistics.

The project builds upon lessons learned from three statistical development projects implemented by the Department of Economic and Social Affairs Statistics Division in the Caribbean Community, Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and ESCWA regions. The project will be executed by the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, in collaboration with the Statistics...