GSARS Concludes its First Regional Workshop: Strengthening Data Analysis and Dissemination to Heighten the Value of Agricultural Survey Data

The Global Strategy to Improve Agricultural and Rural Statistics (GSARS) successfully concluded its first regional workshop of Phase II under the topic: Strengthening Data Analysis and Dissemination to Heighten the Value of Agricultural Survey Data” from April 23 to 25, 2024. 

This workshop, opened by the FAO Representative of Côte d'Ivoire Mr Attaher Maiga, was held at one of the partner statistical schools, ENSEA in Abidjan. The workshop brought together the FAO implementing partners, PARIS21, and UNECA along with over 100 statisticians, agricultural experts, and representatives from national statistical offices and ministries of Agriculture across Africa to discuss agricultural data analysis and modernization of statistical dissemination programs. 

The first day of the workshop focused on converting agricultural survey data into information through data analysis. The related sessions were organized and facilitated by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). They addressed the monitoring of agricultural indicators concerning CAADP, Losses and Food balance sheets among others. 

After an introduction to thematic area on monitoring the agricultural indicators framework, conducted by FAO Survey Team, some countries shared their experience in indicators computation. These were Burkina Faso, through the Representative of the Ministry of Agriculture, Ghana, through the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS), and Zimbabwe, through the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZimStat). 

Following the country experiences, the participants got down to group discussions to share their thoughts about the relevance of targeted indicators, challenges encountered with the computation of those indicators and possible actions points in terms of data sources, methods, computation and monitoring of the indicators. Participants were divided into four groups, each tasked with discussing the topics and preparing short presentations on their findings. The groups then presented their discussions and recommendations in a plenary session, enhancing the collective understanding of data accessibility issues and proposing practical steps to address them. 

The day ended with a focus session on farm typology. After the presentation of the Ghana Statistical Service, Institut National de la Statistique of Mali (INSTAT), Zambia Statistics Agency (ZamStats) and the Ministry of Agriculture of Burkina Faso on farm typology applied to their respective context, FAO shown a comparison of key indicators between these countries. 

The second day of the workshop concentrated on modernizing statistical dissemination programs. Organized and facilitated by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the sessions aimed to explore and share solutions and tools to ensure the modernization of dissemination programs and increase access to agricultural data. 

The day began with a series of presentations. FAO highlighted the critical need for countries to modernize their dissemination strategies to keep pace with evolving IT-based solutions and better serve users. Guinea's representatives shared their experience in releasing survey and census results through their national Open Data portal, providing valuable insights into their Open Data initiative. The Lesotho Bureau of Statistics presented their data dissemination policy, detailing its execution, practical benefits, and challenges faced in implementation. Nigeria's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) discussed the dissemination of the 2022 National Agricultural Sample Census (NASC) Listing microdata under the support of the GSARS-II.  

Following the presentations, participants engaged in group discussions to dive into specific questions related to data accessibility, metadata and documentation, Open Data, and microdata sharing. These discussions were designed to create a comprehensive understanding of the different dimensions of data accessibility and to develop practical steps to overcome dissemination challenges. Participants were divided into four groups, each tasked with discussing specific topics and preparing short presentations on their findings. 

The groups then presented their discussions and recommendations in a plenary session, enhancing the collective understanding of data accessibility issues and proposing practical steps to address them. This session was followed by a focus session led by FAO on microdata sharing programs, providing an overview of the main aspects associated with their implementation. 

The workshop aimed to share experiences and solutions for the computation of agricultural indicators and modernizing dissemination programs, discuss challenges in practical applications, and evaluate dissemination packages. Additionally, it sought to increase awareness of dissemination policies among stakeholders and identify barriers, distinguishing between technical and institutional challenges.