According to a Business Recorder Report from Islamabad (December 13), participants in a workshop on "Preparation of Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP-II)" expressed serious concern over poor data system, pointing out that the information dissemination process in vogue, reeks of a plethora of misleading statistics, thereby rendering the entire policy work dubious.
Significantly, the news report also has it that while agreeing with this view of lack of authenticity of the official data as confusing issue, Dr A.R. Kamal, of Sustainable Development and Policy Institute (SDPI), endorsed the need for addressing it on priority basis.
Notably, he also averred that authenticity of data was must for policy work, and for setting rational targets for all the key areas. In this regard, he made a pointed reference to poverty reduction strategy, budgetary preparation, besides other policy works, stressing that none of these areas could be properly handled in the absence of reliable official data.
Elaborating on a glaring lack of reliable data, Dr Kamal found it spread all over the place, and in all sectors, describing the pile of inaccuracy as a Pandora's box. The malady, he said, also encompasses education, health, rather every sector with a key role in the country's progress and development.
Calling it unfortunate, he urged the Finance Ministry, and rightly so, to come out with necessary funding to put in place a Federal Statistical Authority to ensure expeditious correcting of data of all the sectors.
The government, he added, must feel the urgency and sensitivity of the issue and take practical steps to work out a system which could give a true picture of the situation and help the government prepare real and realistic policies.
As for the seriousness of the situation thus developing, Dr Kamal lamented that all the government institutions, at both the federal and provincial levels, have been providing different data, and making it difficult for policymakers to have a clear picture of things.
As a sequel to such inconsistencies, Pakistan's industrial sector would find it immensely difficult to compete with the international players, thereby leaving some of local industries with no other option but to close down.
However, pointing to quality and enhanced production as the key to success under the new system of globalisation, he contended that in the long run globalisation is going to benefit Pakistan.
It is, however, another matter that, Advisor to the Prime Minister on Finance, Dr Salman Shah, understandably deemed it politic to assure the participants that the government is taking a number of steps to have correct and reliable official data, quoting an ongoing exercise to have an independent Statistics authority.
On his part, Dr Ashfaque Hasan Khan, while agreeing with Dr Kamal on the necessity of authentic data in preparing accurate policies, claimed that Pakistan was plagued by a bad image at all levels. In this regard, he recalled a detailed presentation he made to G22 countries at Paris Club meeting some time back, telling it that Pakistan was not as poor as painted by some international agencies and not as week as was being portrayed in some reports.
Many and varied being instances of responsible men in the government focusing more on programmes and future prospects, than on real hard work, the snail's pace of progress in the desired directions cannot be disputed.
However, about the alarming situation resulting from unreliable data, to serious concern was expressed lately by the International Monetary Fund over the Government's Finance Statistics (GFS), pointing out that it suffered from lack of adequate reporting of fiscal operations by provinces and local governments.
The Fund further said that the concepts and definitions used in compiling GFS were broadly based on the methodology prescribed in a Manual on Government Finance Statistics, 1986 (GFSM), except that the treatment of privatisation proceeds resembled the methodology of the Government Finance Statistics Manual (GFSM) 2001.
According to the Fund, the scope of GFS is budgetary, which does not cover the extra-budgetary funds. It also noted that classification and sectorisation systems followed the GFSM 1986 standards only to a limited extent, pointing out that institutional sectors were not explicitly defined, since only budgetary data are covered in the GFS.
More to this, it said that although central and provincial governments are distinguished, local governments are included with the provincial governments, saying the classification of expenditure departed substantially from the GFSM 1986 methodology, because the economic and functional classifications were mixed in reporting with defence and government administration expenditures not clearly distinguished.
It will, however, be noted that, generally speaking, the participants of the workshop urged the government to establish an independent Federal Statistics Authority (FSA) to ensure collection of reliable data of all the key sectors, mainly covering health, education, and agriculture.
Needless to point out, they appeared to have concluded that reliable data of key sectors were indispensable for official consumption in framing policy framework.