Twenty-ninth session
11-14 February 1997
Item 6 of the provisional agenda*
The Secretary-General has the honour to transmit to the Statistical Commission the progress report of the Inter-Agency Task Force on Service Statistics. The report is contained in the annex. The report is transmitted to the Commission in accordance with a request of the Statistical Commission at its twenty-eighth session. 1 Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 1995, Supplement No. 8 (E/1995/28), para. 38.
1. The Inter-Agency Task Force on Service Statistics held its fifth meeting on 21 and 22 May 1996 at the headquarters of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris.
2. An inventory of the activities and requirements of international institutions relating to trade-in-services statistics by the World Trade Organization (WTO), International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA), OECD and the Statistical Office of the European Communities (Eurostat) was presented. It was decided that a regular update of the inventory would be carried out.
3. The preparation of a yearbook on trade-in-services statistics was discussed. The conclusion of the discussion was that such a project would be premature.
4. The preparation of a manual on trade-in-services statistics was decided upon. WTO and OECD are jointly contributing resources to the preparation of a draft manual, which will be presented and discussed at the meeting of the Task Force to be held in New York on 17 and 18 February 1997.