DR. Vicente B. Valdepeñas, Jr., president of the Philippine Statistical Association (PSA), urged members of the PSA chapters in Central Visayas and Iloilo to collaborate in the effort to break down regional data to local levels.
Valdepeñas issued the call during the “First Visayas Convention on Statistics” that opened yesterday in Cebu City. The convention will end today.
Valdepeñas asked the chapters to “collaborate in the effort to disaggregate regional data down to their provincial, city, and municipal levels.” The PSA is holding its
first Visayas convention on statistics.
He said “sub-national data are frequently disaggregated by region, which is not very useful as local government units are at the provincial, city and municipal levels.”
He added that as many of the members of the PSA are located in a municipality or city in a province, “you are in an exceptional position to assist the major statistical agencies of government in the effort to disaggregate regional data into their provincial, city and municipal levels.”
Professor Fernando Fajardo, in his talk during the 7th Sun.Star Economic Forum (SEF) last week, lamented the lack of data at the provincial level to measure and monitor Cebu’s economic performance and its impact on national development efforts and the well-being of Cebuanos.
The situation led participants of the SEF to pursue the coming up of a database that will compile and make available information on Cebu to policy makers and the public, especially the business community. The SEF, together with other stakeholders in the community, will work toward the establishment of the Cebu Information Bureau (CIB), a common database on socio-economic indicators on Cebu. (Caesar Atienza)