Ukraine’s cooperation with international organisations in the field of statistics is aimed at improving Ukraine’s legislation in this area, developing new standards and adopting best practices. In recent years, development assessments of European countries have increasingly focused on the challenges and prospects for the development of regional and local statistics, which helps ensure that decisions are based on real data and meet the needs of local communities.
As part of the project “Comprehensive Study of Data Needs at the Local Level and Development of the Concept of Municipal Statistics and the Relevant Draft Law,” a team of experts from the Innovation Development Centre, Ivan Franko National University of Lviv, and the Drohobych City Institute, with the support of the USAID GOVERLA Project , conducted a study of international practices in the field of local and regional statistics.
The study showed that leading international organisations such as the UN, OECD and World Bank play a key role in developing standards and recommendations for local statistics. These standards define the general principles of data collection and presentation, which are then used by both international organisations and national statistical offices.
Particular attention was paid to the experience of the European Union. Eurostat, the EU’s statistical agency, sets common standards for economic and financial statistics of its member states, including local level data. These standards define the methodology for collecting and processing statistical information at different levels of administrative and territorial structure. Eurostat produces statistics in various fields, such as economy, labour, trade, science and innovation, health, education, social conditions. The main topics of measurement include general and regional statistics, economy and finance, population and social conditions, industry, trade and services, agriculture and fisheries, foreign trade, transport, environment and energy.
To analyse international practices, the EU countries were selected from the circle of countries strategically important for Ukraine (Germany, France and neighbouring Poland) and countries (Denmark, Sweden, Finland) that have provided assistance and support to Ukraine in bringing Ukrainian statistics closer to European standards, in particular through the Twinning and PXWEB programmes. The experience of Austria, the United Kingdom and Canada was also considered.
This publication provides a brief overview of the international experience of Poland. The full text of the study with an overview of other countries is available here.
The main regulatory document that defines the organisational framework, methodological principles and areas of statistical observation in Poland is the 1995 Act on State Statistics, which is fully harmonised with EU regulations. Regional Statistical Offices are producers of regional and local statistics that collect data on the ground. The Central Statistical Office (CSO) sets methodological standards, coordinates and supervises the work of regional offices, and regional offices provide statistics to the CSO, which aggregates and consolidates them. Other agencies may also commission special statistical surveys within their competence.
Interaction is based on annual statistical programmes, methodological standards, and coordination meetings. Regional offices collect and process local statistics in the context of voivodeships, counties and gminas. Funding for statistical work under the plan of state statistical surveys is provided from the state budget. Regional statistical offices may also perform other statistical work on request under contracts on a paid basis.
The methodology of statistical surveys in Poland is based on Eurostat standards, UN and ILO recommendations. State statistical surveys widely use sample surveys, including sample surveys of households. For local statistics, zoning by administrative-territorial division is used, and data are disseminated in the form of statistical compilations, bulletins, and online services.
To collect and disseminate statistical indicators, Poland has created the BANK DANYCH LOKALNYCH Data Bank, which is the largestdatabase on the economy, society and the environment in Poland (Figure 1.1). The Bank offers more than 40 thousand statistical characteristics grouped by topic. The first data available to the Bank dates back to 1995. Among the groups of indicators, there are data by administrative-territorial division – various thematic data are collected and summarised for a selected administrative unit (city, gmina, district, voivodeship, country) or statistical unit according to the NUTS nomenclature (macro-region, region, sub-region).
Fig. 1.1 View of the web interface of the BANK DANYCH LOKALNYCH data bank
In terms of regional research, it is interesting to note the releases of statistics for cities according to the DegUrba (Degree of Urbanisation) classification as part of the Urban Statistics (formerly Urban Audit) project (Fig. 1.2).
Fig. 1.2 Polish cities and functional urban areas according to the DegUrba classification. The image is accompanied by a list of Urban Audit cities – XLSX file and a list of FUA municipalities – XLSX file
Data sources of Polish statistics:
- censuses of population and housing stock – conducted every 10 years, provide data with a breakdown by territory;
- sample household surveys – to study demographic, economic and social characteristics of the population;
- administrative statistical reporting of enterprises and institutions – covering various sectors of the economy and areas of activity;
- financial statements of business entities submitted to the REGON register (Figure 1.3);
Fig. 1.3 View of the sample result from the open data of the REGON register
- data from departmental registers – civil registration, medical statistics, labour market data, etc;
- data from agricultural censuses and sample continuous surveys of agricultural producers;
- special statistical observations in certain areas;
- data from other surveys and studies;
Digital solutions used:
- electronic data collection – ESPOń system, through which enterprises submit statistical reports online;
- data processing – use of STATA software to analyse census and housing data;
- infographics – online dashboards of labour market data in the voivodeships;
- web scraping – collection of data on food prices from the websites of supermarket chains;
- cloud services – using Microsoft Azure to store microdata from surveys;
- machine learning – forecasting migration flows using regression analysis;
- mobile data collection – use of tablets by interviewers during the census;
- on the portal of the Main Statistical Office of Poland:
- Atlas Regionów (Fig. 1.4) – GIS interactive maps visualising statistical indicators.
Fig. 1.4 Home page of the AtlasRegionów website
- Geostatistical portal (Fig. 1.5) within the framework of the project “Spatial Statistics in the State Information System”.
Fig. 1.5 View of the main page of the Geostatistical portal
The STRATEG system (Fig. 1.6) contains information on key indicators, including indicators for monitoring the achievement of the country’s development goals set out in the most important strategic documents. The “Portrait of Territorial Units” element allows you to select a territorial unit from the national level to the gmina level.
Fig. 1.6 View of the STRATEGweb interface
- API portal – helps to integrate the data of the Polish SLC with Eurostat through software interfaces (Fig. 1.7).
Fig. 1.7 View of the API portalweb interface
The main ways of disseminating and providing access to local statistics data in Poland:
- publication of generalised statistical compilations by regions and localities (counties and municipalities) on the website of the Main Statistical Office;
- publication of regional statistical bulletins and infographics on key indicators;
- providing open access to databases of indicators by territorial units;
- the possibility of ordering specialised statistical compilations and references on request;
- online visualisation and data search services by region on the official statistics portal;
- publication of microdata (with anonymisation) of surveys for research purposes;
- providing a digital API for automated access to statistical data;
- use of visualisation tools and geoinformation systems for clarity;
- publication of open data in machine-readable formats, integration with the European Data Portal.
Thus, it should be noted that the experience of Poland as an EU member state in terms of local statistics is particularly valuable for Ukraine. A new portal of the State Statistics Service of Ukraine is currently being tested, which already has a version of the online databank, but only at the level of Ukraine. Therefore, the Polish Local Data Bank is interesting because it provides centralised access to local statistics data. This is data for a selected administrative unit – city, gmina, district, voivodeship – and not just the country as a whole. Interesting web-based solutions for presenting geo-statistical information in the Atlas of Regions and the STRATEG system are worthy of note.
In general,the analysis of international practices of the EU, the UK and Canada in the field of municipal and regional statistics has shown that the common features for these countries are the existence of special statistical legislation, central statistical offices and the use of open data. Local statistics is an integral part of the state statistics, and statistical data is available online in various forms, including dashboards, geoportals and APIs. The organisation of local statistics is in line with international standards, and most of the work on its coordination is done at the local level. Important aspects are the coordination of administrative breakdown of territories with NUTS, division of functions between statistical agencies and ministries, use of registers to reduce the burden on respondents, and ensuring confidentiality, timeliness and quality of data.