Copy for information purposes prepared from the United Nations Optical Disk System (ODS)

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COUNCIL

Distr.

GENERAL

E/CN.3/1997/21

9 September 1996

ORIGINAL:

ENGLISH

STATISTICAL COMMISSION

10-14 February 1997

Item 13* of the provisional agenda**

The Secretary-General has the honour to transmit to the Statistical Commission the report of the ACC Subcommittee on Statistical Activities on its thirtieth session, held in New York from 7 to 9 May 1996. The report is transmitted to the Commission as requested at its twenty-eighth session. 1/

1/ Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 1995, Supplement No. 8 (E/1995/28), chap. I, sect. B.

________________________

* The report is also relevant to discussion under agenda items 3-12 and 14.

** E/CN.3/1997/1.

96-23800 (E) 191196 /...

*9623800*

Paragraphs Page

INTRODUCTION	1	4
I.MATTERS FOR ENDORSEMENT OR APPROVAL OF THE CONSULTATIVE COMMITTEE ON PROGRAMME ANDOPERATIONAL QUESTIONS	2	4
II.WORK OF THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON STATISTICAL ACTIVITIES	3 - 36	6
A.Matters arising from the twenty-ninth session of the Subcommittee	3 - 6	6
1. 2000 Population and Housing Census Programme	3	6
2. Migration statistics	4	7
3. Free exchange of methodological publications among organizations in the Subcommittee	5	7
4. Communication by electronic mail	6	7
B. Coordination tools	7 - 8	8
1. The statistics part of the ACC programme classification	7	8
2.New developments relating to coordination tools and their use in the work of the Subcommittee	8	8
C.Coordination of ongoing statistical programmes	9 - 12	8
1.New data collection, processing and dissemination	9	8
2.New development, revision and implementation of standards	10	9
3. Technical cooperation in statistics	11 - 12	9
D.Coordination of the follow-up of statistical activities related to international conferences	13 - 15	10
E. United Nations Common Data Systems Task Force	16	10
F. Matters arising from the work of the Statistical Commission and its Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination	17-36	11
1. Issues related to the work of the task forces	17 - 22	11
2. Critical problems in economic statistics	23 - 28	12
3. Statistical support for policy analysis issues to the international level	29	13
4.World statistics day	30	14
5.Provisional agenda and documentation for the twenty-ninth session of the Statistical Commission	31	14
6. Other business	32 - 36	14

Page

1. The ACC Subcommittee on Statistical Activities held its thirtieth session in New York from 7 to 9 May 1996. The agenda is contained in annex I, the list of participants in annex II, and the list of documents in annex III.

I. MATTERS FOR ENDORSEMENT OR APPROVAL OF THE CONSULTATIVE

COMMITTEE ON PROGRAMME AND OPERATIONAL QUESTIONS

2. The following five matters are brought to the attention of the Consultative Committee on Programme and Operational Questions (CCPOQ):

(a) The Subcommittee (i) agreed that there was a need to establish a firmer basis for discussing the coordination of international statistical work in the Subcommittee in order to promote more effective coordination; (ii) noted that there was qualified support for establishing an integrated presentation of work programmes along the lines of the approach being used in the region of the Economic Commission for Europe (ECE); and (iii) requested the United Nations Statistics Division and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to investigate the pros and cons and general feasibility of establishing such a modified integrated presentation, taking account of both the views expressed during the discussion of this item and those to be provided later by the organizations concerned, and to submit a proposal to the Subcommittee's Bureau at its next session;

(b) The Subcommittee (i) endorsed, in principle, the minimum national social data set that had been recommended by the Expert Group on the Statistical Implications of Recent Major United Nations Conferences at its meetings at Oslo on 10 June 1995 and at Geneva on 13 June 1995 (see E/CN.3/AC.1/1996/R.4, annex, chap. VII and appendix) and subsequently endorsed by the Statistical Commission's Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination at its eighteenth session (New York, 16-18 April 1996) (see E/CN.3/1997/19); (ii) endorsed, in principle, the formation of an expert group on poverty statistics; (iii) endorsed the implementation of pilot studies of data availability for the minimum national social data set; and (iv) requested the Bureau of the Subcommittee to identify any coordination problems in that field that should be brought to the attention of the Subcommittee;

(c) The Subcommittee took note of a number of ad hoc groups that had been established by countries, in cooperation with international organizations, to carry out work on several critical problems in economic statistics; the Subcommittee requested its Bureau, on the basis of the reports that would become available from those and other similar groups, to determine if coordination issues existed that were within the purview of the Subcommittee;

(d) The Subcommittee, on the recommendation of the Bureau, decided that while the Chairman of the Subcommittee should serve for a two-year period and should be eligible for re-election as previously agreed (ACC/1994/1, para. 2 (b)), the newly elected Chairman (elected at the end of a session) should take office only at the beginning of the session after the one in which he or she was elected. During the period between the two sessions, he or she would be Chairman-elect and would attend Bureau meetings. The Chairman of the previous session would continue as Chairman up to the opening of the next session. The Subcommittee decided that the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) (Mr. A. Flatt) would join the Bureau immediately following the thirtieth session, replacing the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) (Mr. P. Sainz), whose term would expire at that time;

(e) The Subcommittee recommended that its thirty-first session be held from 16 to 18 September 1997 at the headquarters of the International Labour Organization (ILO) in Geneva. The provisional agenda and documentation - subject to review and finalization by the Bureau, which was requested to take account of suggestions from members of the Subcommittee - was agreed as follows:

1. Matters arising from the thirtieth session.

Documentation

Report of the Secretariat on decisions made at the thirtieth session of the ACC Subcommittee on Statistical Activities

2. Coordination tools:

(a) The statistics part of the ACC Programme Classification;

(b) Uses of and new developments in the coordination tools of the Subcommittee.

Documentation

Report prepared jointly by the ILO, ESCAP and the International Statistical Institute (ISI) on current and potential uses of the ACC Programme Classification, and proposals for any desirable changes

Report of the Secretariat on uses of and new developments in the coordination tools of the ACC Subcommittee on Statistical Activities

3. Coordination of ongoing statistical programmes:

(a) Improved reporting for the coordination of international statistical work;

(b) Technical cooperation.

Documentation

Report of the Secretariat and IMF on improved reporting for the coordination of international statistical work

4. Matters arising from the work of the Statistical Commission and its Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination:

(a) Coordination issues related to the work of the task forces;

(b) Coordination of the follow-up to the statistical implications of recent major United Nations conferences;

(c) Critical problems in economic statistics;

(d) Follow-up to the twenty-ninth session of the Statistical Commission.

Documentation

Reports of the task forces

Report of the Secretariat on the follow-up to the twenty-ninth session of the Statistical Commission

5. Other business:

(a) ACC Subcommittee on Demographic Estimates and Projections;

(b) Chairmanship and the Bureau of the ACC Subcommittee on Statistical Activities;

(c) Dates, place and agenda of the thirty-second session.

Documentation

Report of the Subcommittee on Demographic Estimates and Projections on its nineteenth session

6. Adoption of actions and decisions taken at the thirty-first session.

A. Matters arising from the twenty-ninth session of

the Subcommittee

3. The Subcommittee noted that (a) an expert group meeting on the recommendations for the Programme was scheduled to be held at New York from 9 to 13 September 1996; (b) interested organizations would contribute technical inputs to the meeting; and (c) draft recommendations would be submitted to the Statistical Commission at its twenty-ninth session.

4. The Subcommittee noted that (a) a meeting of the Expert Group on the Revision of the United Nations Recommendations on Migration Statistics had been convened at New York from 10 to 14 July 1995; (b) the United Nations Statistics Division and the Statistical Office of the European Communities (Eurostat) had scheduled a meeting with concerned international organizations to identify and resolve any problems with the current draft revised recommendations; and (c) the draft revised recommendations would be submitted to the Statistical Commission at its twenty-ninth session.

3. Free exchange of methodological publications among

organizations in the Subcommittee

5. Based on a proposal made by the Bureau (SA/1996/3, para. 3) and in the light of discussion under that agenda item, the Subcommittee:

(a) Recognized that each organization had its own policies for dissemination of outputs, and in most cases those policies were set outside statistics divisions;

(b) Agreed that each organization should provide one free copy of each statistical methodological publication to other members of the Subcommittee on request, and should provide additional copies at normal prices. The Subcommittee noted that that policy should not prevent organizations from adopting a more generous approach or entering into additional arrangements on a bilateral basis; indeed, it encouraged organizations to do so;

(c) Requested the Bureau to look into the question of providing copies of methodological publications in more than one language, where available.

6. The Subcommittee welcomed the fact that most of the documents for the current session had been distributed to all participants by electronic mail (e-mail), using both direct transmission to individual addresses and transmission through the list server service that had been set up with the assistance of the Information Systems Coordinating Committee. Some technical problems that had been experienced by some members were being investigated. The Subcommittee requested the Secretariat to continue using e-mail technology. It requested all members to provide the Secretariat with any corrections or additions to the list of e-mail addresses that the Secretariat had distributed at the meeting and to register with the list server service if they had not already done so. The Subcommittee also considered a suggestion to place its documents on the Internet for the convenience of participants; it concluded that that approach could be tested but would not be appropriate as the standard method of distribution at that time because not all organizations had the requisite technology.

7. The Subcommittee:

(a) Welcomed the work of the ILO, ESCAP and ISI on the modified ACC Programme Classification that they had proposed;

(b) Requested the ILO, ESCAP and ISI to continue to work together to (i) clarify the specific uses that would benefit from a revised classification, (ii) prepare a suitable draft revised classification, taking into account, where appropriate, the comments made during the discussion under that agenda item and any others submitted in writing by interested organizations, and (iii) submit the draft to the Bureau at its next session;

(c) Requested the Bureau to review the draft provided to it and decide whether it should be presented to the Subcommittee at its thirty-first session.

2. New developments relating to coordination tools and their

use in the work of the Subcommittee

8. The Subcommittee:

(a) Decided not to proceed with the proposed revision of the Directory of International Statistics due to the lack of support and input required for its preparation;

(b) Requested the Statistics Division to consider ways to combine into a single product the inventory of statistical data-collection activities, the list of classifications used in statistics, the inventory of computerized statistical databases and the proposed annotated list of methodological publications;

(c) Requested the Statistics Division to consider alternative ways in which to make the above product(s)/information available to users, including the possibility of using Internet and other electronic means of dissemination;

(d) Requested the Statistics Division to report on the above to the Bureau at its next meeting.

9. The Subcommittee:

(a) Agreed that there was a need for a more cohesive basis to discuss coordination of international statistical work in the Subcommittee, with the aim of promoting more effective coordination;

(b) Noted that there was qualified support for an integrated presentation of work programmes, along the lines of the approach being used in the ECE region;

(c) Requested the United Nations Statistics Division and IMF to investigate the pros, cons and feasibility of a modified integrated presentation, taking account of the views expressed during the discussion under this agenda item and to be provided later by concerned organizations, and submit a proposal to the Bureau at its next session;

(d) Requested the Bureau to consider the findings of the Statistics Division and IMF, and decide whether a task force should be established to pursue the matter further, and to report to the Subcommittee at its next session.

10. The Subcommittee:

(a) Took note of the Special Data Dissemination Standard that had been developed by IMF;

(b) Considered that it would be useful to consider ways in which members of the Subcommittee could collaborate in the process of implementation and further development;

(c) Requested IMF to report to the Bureau at its next meeting on progress relating to the implementation of the Special Standard, and development of the General Data Dissemination Standard.

(a) General issues, including bilateral technical cooperation

11. The Subcommittee noted the efforts of the United Nations Statistics Division in compiling the report on technical cooperation for the twenty-ninth session of the Statistical Commission, and the difficulties encountered.

(b) Implementation of the System of National Accounts, 1993

12. The Subcommittee noted the progress report provided by the Statistics Division, as Chair of the Inter-Secretariat Working Group on National Accounts (ISWGNA), regarding the activities carried out by the ISWGNA to assess and define strategies for implementation of the System of National Accounts, 1993.

D. Coordination of the follow-up of statistical activities

related to international conferences

13. The Subcommittee considered this agenda item on the basis of the report of the Expert Group on the Statistical Implications of Recent Major United Nations Conferences (E/CN.3/AC.1/1996/R.4, annex).

14. The Subcommittee endorsed, in principle, both the recommended minimum national social data set, as contained in the report and endorsed and recommended to the Statistical Commission by the Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination, and the formation of an expert group on poverty statistics. The Subcommittee welcomed the proposal of ECLAC to consult with the other regional commissions as well as interested countries and organizations to prepare technical materials for the proposed expert group and the proposed seminar on poverty statistics in 1997. The Subcommittee noted that any comments and suggestions on the minimum national social data set should be made to the Statistics Division, which would bring them to the attention of the Statistical Commission. The Subcommittee also endorsed the recommendation of the Working Group concerning the implementation of pilot studies of data availability for the minimum national social data set.

15. In conclusion, the Subcommittee asked the Bureau to identify, at its next meeting, any coordination problems in the field that should be brought to the attention of the Subcommittee at its next meeting.

16. The Subcommittee:

(a) Endorsed the Common Code of Statistical Practice in the United Nations System, which had been adopted by the United Nations Common Data System Task Force at its meeting in New York on 14 and 15 February 1996. The Subcommittee recognized that the code constituted a series of guidelines to be voluntarily applied to the extent possible rather than a set of obligatory standards;

(b) Encouraged organizations to distribute the Common Code within their organizations, and to apply the practices that it contained to the extent possible;

(c) Welcomed the intention of the Statistics Division and IMF to promote coordination between the Common Code and the IMF data dissemination standards;

(d) Welcomed the intention of the Statistics Division to keep the Common Code up to date and the collaborative approach that it intended to follow in the preparation of future modules of the Common Code;

(e) Invited organizations to provide the Statistics Division with their ideas and preferences for items to be covered by future modules of the Common Code.

F. Matters arising from the work of the Statistical Commission

and its Working Group on International Statistical

Programmes and Coordination

(a) Task Force on International Trade Statistics

17. The Subcommittee noted the work accomplished by the Task Force.

(b) Task Force on Service Statistics

18. The Subcommittee noted the work accomplished by the Task Force, and welcomed the progress being made by the United Nations Statistics Division on statistics on the domestic (within country) sector in developing countries, involving reports by consultants and plans to hold an expert group on service statistics in Addis Ababa from 17 to 21 June 1996.

(c) Task Force on Industrial and Construction Statistics

19. The Subcommittee noted the work done by the Task Force, and agreed with its conclusion on the importance and difficulties of monitoring the implementation of the International Standard Industrial Classification of All Economic Activities, Revision 3 (ISIC, Rev. 3). The Subcommittee also noted with satisfaction the completion of the draft revision of the International Recommendations for Construction Statistics in accordance with the request of the Statistical Commission at its twenty-eighth session.

(d) Task Force on Environment Statistics

20. The Subcommittee noted that the planned second meeting of the Task Force had had to be cancelled since most of its members had indicated that they would be unable to attend. The Convener (United Nations Statistics Division) informed the Subcommittee about the efforts under way to obtain information by correspondence from the members of the Task Force on their planned activities and priorities, and, as requested by the Statistical Commission, to define and provide milestones against which each organization could measure progress in a particular activity and in the whole programme. The Subcommittee expressed support for those efforts, and requested the members of the Task Force to supply the relevant information for inclusion in its report to the Statistical Commission at its twenty-ninth session.

(e) Task Force on Finance Statistics

21. The Subcommittee noted the progress report given by the representative of IMF, as Convener of the Task Force. In particular, the Convener indicated that in presenting a report at the twenty-ninth session of the Statistical Commission, the Task Force would re-examine issues of coordination in finance statistics. If that review demonstrated that the Task Force had fulfilled its mandate, the Task Force would recommend that it be discontinued.

(f) General issues related to the work of the task forces

22. The Subcommittee, recalling the origins, terms of reference, reporting practices and expected life cycle of the task forces considered under agenda item 5 (a) (see paras. 17-21 above):

(a) Recognized that the task forces had been created by the Statistical Commission, and therefore reported to either the Commission or its Working Group;

(b) Considered that questions of membership in the task forces should be determined according to the rules of procedure of the functional commissions of the Economic and Social Council;

(c) Confirmed that the Subcommittee should focus on coordination issues in the work of the task forces;

(d) Reconfirmed that the Subcommittee itself could establish task forces, working groups, ad hoc groups and other groups, as necessary, which would report to the Subcommittee;

(e) Agreed that the assessment of the task forces requested by the Working Group, which would be carried out by the Statistics Division, could be achieved by a review of both their terms of reference and their performance in relation to those terms of reference. The Subcommittee noted that the Statistics Division would prepare a draft overall analysis, consult with the conveners of the task forces, and finalize the report for the Statistical Commission.

(a) General considerations

23. The Subcommittee was briefed in an oral report by the Statistics Division on the work of the Expert Group on the topic and the actions taken by the Working Group.

24. In particular, the Subcommittee took note that a number of groups constituted along the lines of the Voorburg Group on Service Statistics, whose members were predominantly national statistical agencies but also included international organizations, had been enlisted by the Working Group to address specific critical issues. The Subcommittee was informed that those groups had been invited to present progress reports at the twenty-ninth session of the Statistical Commission. The Subcommittee also received clarification that the role of the Statistics Division was limited to facilitating the workings of the groups and making their outputs widely accessible.

25. The Subcommittee suggested that the group charged with formulating a draft code of best practices should recognize the work already undertaken by IMF in the context of the Special Data Dissemination Standard.

26. With regard to the relationship between such groups and the Subcommittee, the Subcommittee agreed that, to the extent that the issues that they addressed warranted improved coordination by international agencies, they would be considered by the Subcommittee (see paras. 27 and 28 below).

(b) Relationship between various groups

27. The Subcommittee noted the array of groups that had been or were in the process of being established to carry out statistical work, including the task forces established by the Statistical Commission, groups constituted along the lines of the Voorburg Group on Service Statistics that had already been established, and similar groups that were in the process of being established to pursue work in the area of critical problems in economic statistics (see paras. 23-26 above).

28. The Subcommittee noted that all of the above-mentioned groups included some members of the Subcommittee in their membership. The Subcommittee considered that the work of the groups should involve the Subcommittee only to the extent that relevant coordination issues arose, although it was recognized that it might be difficult, as a practical matter, to be aware of the existence of such issues. The Subcommittee requested the Bureau, on the basis of reports that would become available to the Statistics Division on the work of the groups, to determine if coordination issues existed that were within the purview of the Subcommittee and to bring such issues to its attention.

3. Statistical support for policy analysis issues at the

international level

29. The Subcommittee recalled that it had taken concerted and successful action over a number of years to reduce the duplication of requests to countries, and confirmed that the Subcommittee and individual members were continuing to pay attention to the problem. However, in response to the renewed request of the Statistical Commission's Working Group, the Subcommittee agreed that the Statistics Division should assemble a report that would, inter alia, (a) indicate new ways in which the international organizations were collecting data from countries, without the use of questionnaires, that reduced the reporting burden on countries; (b) describe new initiatives being taken in individual organizations to identify and reduce duplication in data collection within those organizations; and (c) respond to any replies received from national statistical offices to an inquiry that, on a proposal of the Statistics Division, would be sent out by the Chairman of the Statistical Commission's Working Group, inviting countries to bring to the attention of the Statistics Division any instances of duplicative requests for data by international organizations; and (d) indicate whether the inventory of statistical data-collection activities was being kept up to date and was being used for coordination purposes.

30. The Subcommittee reconfirmed the conclusion that it had reached at its twenty-ninth session, namely that while it recognized the value of national statistical days in those countries that had them, it had reservations on the potential value of and support for holding a world statistics day, especially in the light of the resources needed and the absence of well-developed objectives (see ACC/1995/14, para. 25). The Subcommittee noted that the Statistics Division, as requested by the Working Group, would prepare a draft report for the Statistical Commission and circulate it to members of the Subcommittee for comments and input.

5. Provisional agenda and documentation for the twenty-ninth

session of the Statistical Commission

31. The Subcommittee noted the agenda items and documents that would require input from its members, particularly the report on plans of international organizations in statistics, for which the Statistics Division would request input in the near future. The Subcommittee requested the Bureau to act on its behalf in providing any requested input for or comments on the report containing a review of the efforts aimed at strengthening international statistical cooperation since 1992.

(a) ACC Subcommittee on Demographic Estimates and Projections

32. In considering the work of the ACC Subcommittee on Demographic Estimates and Projections (SCDEP), the Subcommittee agreed that coordination among all the international organizations that were producing demographic estimates and projections was important. The Subcommittee also noted that Eurostat had major activities in the area, and welcomed the arrangements that had been made for consultations between the Population Division of the United Nations Secretariat and Eurostat following the nineteenth session of SCDEP in June 1996. The Subcommittee noted that, at that session, SCDEP would take up the issue of observers participating in its sessions.

(b) The concept of occasional part-day sessions on a special topic, with invited guest speakers

33. The Subcommittee agreed, on an experimental basis, to provide for occasional part-day sessions on special topics, with invited guest speakers. The Subcommittee invited interested members to make proposals to the Bureau, and requested the Bureau to consider the suitability, possible timing and funding aspects of such proposals. Preference would initially be given to coordination-related issues rather than substantive issues.

(c) United Nations Economic and Social Information System

34. The Statistics Division presented an oral report on progress in and plans for the implementation of the United Nations Economic and Social Information System (UNESIS). The Subcommittee welcomed the proposal of the Statistics Division to set up a network of informal contact points for the exchange of technical information and comments on database, network and metadata systems development in the area of statistics. The Subcommittee agreed that it was not realistic to consider the development of a complete set of common standards among the agencies in that field but that exchange of information and experience could be used by each agency as valuable input to its own work on re-engineering its statistical databases, and in moving towards a desirable subset of those standards. The Subcommittee noted that part of the future work of the Statistics Division would involve consideration of linkages on the World Wide Web. The Subcommittee also agreed that it might want to consider whether there were coordination issues to be addressed after more experience had been gained in each agency's programmes.

(d) Timing of meetings of the Subcommittee

35. The Subcommittee agreed with the recommendation of the Bureau that Subcommittee meetings be held in the period June-September each year, preferably in September, given the schedule of the Statistical Commission and its Working Group. The Subcommittee also recalled its previous decision that heads of statistics of participating organizations should be expected to attend Subcommittee meetings.

(e) Chairmanship and the Bureau

36. The Subcommittee, on the recommendation of the Bureau, decided that, while the Chairman of the Subcommittee should serve for a two-year period and should be eligible for re-election, as previously agreed (ACC/1994/1, para. 2 (b)), the newly elected Chairman (elected at the end of session) should take office only at the beginning of the session after the one in which he or she had been elected. During the period between the two sessions, he or she would be Chairman-elect and would attend Bureau meetings. The Chairman of the previous session would continue as Chairman up to the opening of the next session. The Subcommittee decided that ESCAP (Mr. A. Flatt) would join the Bureau immediately following the thirtieth session, replacing ECLAC (Mr. P. Sainz), whose term would expire at that time.

1. Preliminaries:

(a) Adoption of the agenda and schedule;

(b) Adoption of minutes of previous meeting;

(c) Matters arising from the twenty-ninth session.

2. Coordination tools:

(a) The statistics part of the ACC Programme Classification;

(b) New developments relating to the inventory of statistical data-collection activities; the list of classifications used in statistics; the inventory of computerized statistical databases; the Directory of International Statistics; and the newly proposed annotated list of methodological publications;

(c) The uses of coordination tools in the work of the Subcommittee.

3. Coordination of ongoing statistical programmes:

(a) New data collection, processing and dissemination;

(b) New development, revision and implementation of standards;

(c) Technical cooperation:

(i) General issues, including bilateral technical cooperation;

(ii) Implementation of the System of National Accounts 1993.

4. Coordination of the follow-up of statistical activities related to international conferences.

5. Matters arising from the work of the United Nations Statistical Commission and its Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination:

(a) Issues related to the work of the task forces;

(b) Critical problems in economic statistics;

(c) Provisional agenda and documentation for the twenty-ninth session of the Statistical Commission;

(d) Statistical support for policy analysis issues at the international level;

(e) World statistics day.

6. Other business:

(a) The concept of occasional part-day sessions on a special topic, with invited guest;

(b) ACC Subcommittee on Demographic Estimates and Projections;

(c) United Nations Economic and Social Information System;

(d) United Nations Common Data Systems Task Force;

(e) Timing of meetings;

(f) Chairmanship and Bureau of the Subcommittee;

(g) Dates and venue of the thirty-first session.

7. Adoption of actions and decisions taken at the thirtieth session.

United Nations entities and programmes

Statistics Division, Department for Economic and Social Information and Policy Analysis of the United Nations Secretariat	H. Habermann O. Jackson G. Carissimo V. Drjuchin C. Hannig R. Johnston R. Roberts S. Schweinfest
Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific	A. J. Flatt
Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean	P. Sainz
United Nations Children's Fund	M. Hereward G. Jones
United Nations Population Fund	C. S. Pierce
United Nations Drug Control Programme	W. Gulbinat

Specialized agencies and related organizations

International Labour Organization	F. Mehran
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations	B. Touré
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization	G. Nascimento
International Civil Aviation Organization	A. Costaguta
World Health Organization	H. R. Hapsara
World Bank	E. Swanson
International Monetary Fund	J. McLenaghan
United Nations Industrial Development Organization	T. Yamada

Other intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations

Interstate Statistical Committee of the Commonwealth of Independent States

M. Korolev

Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development	H. Brüngger
Statistical Office of the European Community	Ph. Nanopoulos J. Whitworth
World Tourism Organization	E. Paci

ACC bodies

Subcommittee on Demographic Estimates and Projections

B. Bucht J. A. Grinblat

Document No.	Agenda item	Title or description
SA/1996/1	1 (a)	Provisional agenda
SA/1996/1/Add.1	1 (a)	Proposed schedule of discussion
SA/1996/2	1 (c)	Report of the partial Bureau meeting (Beijing, 25 August 1995)
SA/1996/3	1 (c)	Report of the Bureau meeting (New York, 19 April 1996)
SA/1996/4	2 (a)	The statistics part of the ACC Programme Classification
SA/1996/5	2 (b)	Improvement of coordination tools
SA/1996/6	2 (c)	The uses of the coordination tools in the work of the Subcommittee
SA/1996/7	3 (a)	New data collection, processing and dissemination (United Nations Statistics Division)
SA/1996/7	3 (a)	UNESCO's new activities in data collection (UNESCO)
SA/1996/7	3 (a)	New data collection, processing and dissemination of information (Interstate Statistical Committee of the Commonwealth of Independent States)
SA/1996/8	3 (b)	Revision of the International Standard Classification of Education (UNESCO)
SA/1996/8	3 (b)	New development, revision and implementation of standards (United Nations Statistics Division)
SA/1996/7 & 8x	3 (a), 3 (b)	New data collection, processing and dissemination, and new development, revision and implementation of standards (Eurostat
SA/1996/9	3 (c)	Report on technical cooperation in statistics
SA/1996/10	5 (a)	Not issued. Replaced by the note by the Secretary-General transmitting the report of the Inter-Secretariat Working Group on National Accounts to the Statistical Commission's Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination at its eighteenth session (E/CN.3/AC.1/1996/R.2)
SA/1996/11	5 (a)	Report of the Task Force on Environment Statistics
SA/1996/12	4	Not issued. Replaced by the note by the Secretary-General transmitting the report of the Expert Group on the Statistical Implications of Recent Major United Nations Conferences to the Statistical Commission's Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination at its eighteenth session (E/CN.3/AC.1/1996/R.4)
SA/1996/13	1 (c)	Decisions made at the twenty-ninth session of the ACC Subcommittee on Statistical Activities
SA/1996/14	5 (c)	Provisional agenda and documentation for the twenty-ninth session of the Statistical Commission
SA/1996/15	3 (b)	Not issued. Replaced by an IMF report entitled "Standards for the dissemination by countries of economic and financial statistics: the special data dissemination standard", and a related press release, No. 96/20
SA/1996/X		Coordination with the ACC Subcommittee on Demographic Estimates and Projections
E/CN.3/1997/19	All	Report of the Statistical Commission's Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination on its eighteenth session (New York, 16-18 April 1996)
ACC/1995/14	1 (c)	Report of the ACC Subcommittee on Statistical Activities on its twenty-ninth session (Geneva, 15, 16 and 19 June 1995)
-	5 (a)	Background note: report of the Task Force on International Trade Statistics (Geneva, 19-21 March 1996)
E/CN.3/AC.1/1996/R.13	5 (b)	Note by the Secretariat transmitting and R.13/Add.1 the report of the Expert Group on Critical Problems in Economic Statistics to the Statistical Commission's Working Group on International Statistical Programmes and Coordination at its eighteenth session Common code of statistical practice in the United Nations system (Department for Economic and Social Information and Policy Analysis of the United Nations Secretariat/United Nations Statistics Division)
	6 (c)