WORLD BANK LAUNCH POVERTY AND GENDER INEQUALITY PROJECT IN THE PACIFIC

Tonga and Kiribati to act as ‘Pilot’ Countries

The World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors today approved US$4.4 million to modernize statistical and data collection in the Pacific, and another US$2 million each for Tonga and Kiribati to act as ‘pilot’ countries to help demonstrate improvements in regional data collection in coming years.

With the Pacific Islands covering an estimated 640 inhabited islands spread over an area equal to 15% of the globe’s surface, the challenge of gathering accurate, timely and relevant data is immense. The lack of quality data – particularly from some of the region’s most remote locations – remains a critical roadblock to the region’s understanding of poverty, welfare and social developments. Addressing data deficiencies has the potential to drive better policy development and lasting change.

“Our global experience consistently demonstrates that for policy change to be effective, governments must have solid data and statistics on which to base their decision making,” said Michel Kerf, Country Director for the World Bank in Papua New Guinea and the Pacific Islands. “This is why we are investing in helping the Pacific to build a common approach to statistics and data-gathering so that cross-country comparisons can be conducted and regional trends monitored thereby improving the information available for policy making.”

The Statistical Innovation and Capacity Building in Pacific Islands project will support the Statistics for Development Division of the Pacific Community (SPC-SDD) to strengthen its role as a ‘statistical system leader’, promote innovation and better disseminate the recommendations from the Pacific Statistics Methods Board.

The SPC-SDD will also work with the National Statistics Offices in Tonga and Kiribati to modernize their data collection processes so as to improve the comparability, accessibility and sustainability of statistics across the region. Additional countries are expected to join the program in the future.

“Statistics are fundamental to achieving our regional development goals of poverty eradication, food security and equality, economic growth and more,” confirmed Epeli Waqavonovono, Statistics for Development Director, Pacific Community (SPC). “Through this project, we will gain a better understanding of the evolving economic situation in the region and help support policy development that better meets the needs of Pacific people, including marginalized populations such as women and persons with disabilities. It’s a great example of what can be accomplished when like-minded organizations such as SPC and the World Bank work in partnership.”

Closing data gaps in the Pacific is a priority for the World Bank, particularly as a lack of quality data hinders efforts to track progress on gender inequality and the design of policies that could address the gender gap in the region. Fiji, which ranked 125 out of 144 countries, was the only Pacific Island country to be included in the World Economic Forum’s 2017 Global Gender Gap report due to an absence of reliable data from other countries in the region.

The data collected through the project will help inform the monitoring of national outcomes in the Tonga Strategic Development Framework and the Kiribati 20-year Vision (2016-2036). Both countries are already experiencing the extreme impacts of climate change and capturing climate data as it relates to socio-economic indicators is an important focus for the National Statistics Offices.

These new projects are funded through the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank’s fund for the world’s most in-need countries, and are part of a new IDA Regional Program that seeks to address the considerable challenges of data deprivation and poor quality of statistics across the region. This regional program was prepared with the support of the Australian Government.

The World Bank works in partnership with 12 countries across the Pacific Islands and Papua New Guinea, supporting 77 projects totalling $1.73 billion in commitments in sectors including agriculture, aviation and transport, climate resilience and adaptation, economic policy, education and employment, energy, fisheries, health, rural development, telecommunications and tourism.