Santo Domingo. R.D., 5 December 2018 - The Dominican Republic's National Statistics Office (ONE, for its acronym in Spanish), in partnership with the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Development and the National High-Level Inter-Institutional Commission for Sustainable Development (Sustainable Development and SDG Commission), with support from Cepei and the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data, hosted “Dominican Republic: The Path to the Data Revolution to Promote Sustainable Development,” a kickoff meeting, upon joining the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data, to discuss and analyze the availability, quality, and access to data to measure Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicators through non-traditional sources of data and new approaches.
By embracing initiatives such as this one, the Dominican Republic is moving forward with the development of an action plan to increase its data capacities and access, as well as to define needs, challenges, and opportunities to improve its data for sustainable development. This work will also help strengthen the data ecosystem and prioritize strategic workstreams to improve data to monitor and implement the SDGs in the country.
Cepei’s Director, Philipp Schönrock, and the Regional Director for Africa for the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data, Davis Adieno, participated in the opening session and throughout the workshop.
During the event, ONE’s National Director, Alexandra Izquierdo, highlighted the importance of this space to analyze the use of non-traditional sources of data and innovative approaches to tackle the SDGs.
“Recognizing the national potential to use administrative records with statistical purposes and, especially, to monitor and achieve the commitments taken by the country, represents a significant advance in the production of statistical information required to monitor the 17 SDGs and Agenda 2030,” said National Statistician Ms. Izquierdo.
The national workshop – which was opened by Isidoro Santana, Minister of Economy, Planning and Development – had two expert panels with national and international speakers, who analyzed the strategic actions to improve the data required to monitor and achieve the SDGs, with a focus on the People and Planet dimensions.
ONE’s Director explained that, under the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Development's supervision, they undertook a first feasibility assessment to measure SDG indicators, with the objective of identifying data availability and relevance of statistical information to monitor the SDGs, taking into consideration existing and the need for new statistics:
“It is important to highlight that as a country we have taken important and concrete steps to achieve the SDGs. However, there is a long way to produce and access quality, disaggregated data to track the SDGs locally and make evidence-based policymaking.”
ONE’s Director concluded by emphasizing that in order to achieve the SDGs Dominican Republic needs to collaborate with the private sector, civil society, academia, and the media.
