As a part of the Arab League Program to Promote the pioneering social experiences, the Centre for received a delegation of the officials of social development from Arab countries to review the experience of the Centre in supporting the comprehensive development march in Sultanate's economic and social arenas.
The visits took place as part of the bilateral exchange program which aims to share the pioneering social experiences under the umbrella of the Arab League. The delegation learned the role played by the Centre in terms of enhancing knowledge and organisational structure. They also got to know the Sultanate's experience in the statistical work and how to employ data to achieve the sustainable development targets by showing the decision makers the precise data and indicators, which in return enhances the development plans and the future visions of the Sultanate. Furthermore, the delegation got to know the services provided by the Centre to different segments of the society comprising both governmental and private institutions or individuals. "After accrediting the policies of social and economic development on the statistical programs and the data they provide and their role in achieving the sustainable development targets, the delegation was keen on visiting NCSI, highly appreciating the pioneering experience of the Centre ", Tarek Nabil Hassan al Nablsy, Consultant and Director of Development and Social Policies in the Arab League said.
He said that the Arab league invited the Centre to attend a workshop on multi-dimensional poverty indicators, which will be held in Sharm Al Sheikh in Egypt to discuss relating indicators and data to support the policies of countries in order to achieve UN Sustainable Development Programme 2030. "The Centre plays a prominent role in supporting the Sultanate policies to achieve the targets of 2030 sustainable development plan. Moreover, the center is also invited to allow the Arabian countries to benefit from its experiences in this field, especially that the workshop will include all the statistics officials in different Arabian countries", he added. The delegation also watched some audio-visual presentations, they understood the strategy based on building statistical abilities and national databases employing modern technology and transparency in providing data and documenting the statistical work through "Who are we" presentation.
Later, the delegation was introduced to some of the phases of statistical business, which starts by creating the statistical number, then creating information that leads to creating knowledge. In addition to briefing about the issues issued by the Centre, whether the ones related to periodical statistics or the analytical studies. The presentation also included some upcoming projects that are executed by the Centre, like the electronic census 2020 and the related projects. The delegation was also introduced to the role of the Centre in hosting the National Centre of Competitiveness which is concerned with improving competitiveness in the Sultanate and supervising it in the system of international indicators, along with suggesting necessary laws and policies, measuring and following up with the competive ability in the Sultanate on both the regional and international levels, building national abilities in the field of enhancing competitiveness and analyzing the international reports.
Moreover, the delegation was introduced to one of the most important mechanisms of providing information which is represented in the successful partnership with local and foreign media that work on covering all the events that the Centre participates in, and to publish the periodic reports and data issued from the Centre. This was through a visual presentation entitled: "We are wherever you are". The presentation also detailed the Centre experience with various social media avenues including WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram besides its experience in smart phone applications. They also held discussions based on the AV presentations including the levels of knowledge and the partnership with media.
Additionally, it also shed light on the role played by the geographical information system and spatial data in supporting the social development by helping making the right decision based on spatial analysis which in return leads to right planning and increasing the revenue, while achieving sustainable development. The delegation also watched a presentation entitled "From Statements to Services" that briefed the concept of the national structure of spatial information which relies on participating and exchanging information and spatial data between the members. "We are looking forward to benefit from the Centre 's pioneering experience in connecting indicators and data to supporting the country's policy to achieve the UN sustainable development plan", the Director of Development and Social Policies in the Arab League said.
ـــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــ