India First Statistical Strengthening Project

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The Statistical Strengthening Loan Program supports an institution and policy based reform of Government of India for strengthening the state statistical systems within a national policy framework. The four main policy areas which the operation supports are: (I) strengthening the institutions of leadership and coordination of the National Statistical System - this policy area addresses the deterioration in coordination and organizational functioning over the past few decades that has reduced the effectiveness of the Indian Statistical System (ISS); (II) improving and increasing the support from the Central Government and the Ministry of Statistics to the statistical systems of State/Union Territories (UTs) - the support being provided to states is in two main areas: first, a process to establish standards, norms and benchmarks for key statistical activities that contribute to important national data series; and second, technical and financial support for the implementation of the reforms; (III) strengthening the capacity and performance of the statistical systems in a majority of States/UTs in India - the 2001 National Statistical Commission (NSC) Report noted that the failure of the ISS stems from a deterioration in the state statistical systems as a whole, so participation of the states in the reform program is critical and the policy area focuses on integrating the states into the national statistical system through a centrally sponsored scheme; and (IV) improving the coverage, quality, timeliness and credibility of statistics generated by States and UTs - this policy area places emphasis on improvements in the timeliness, coverage, accuracy, consistency and usefulness of the statistics produced by states because the 2001 report observed that over time there has been a decline in the quality and reliability of statistics generated by state statistical systems and data gaps and duplication were leading to conflicting statistics and inordinate delays in transmission and publication of data.