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Werner Bier and Per Nymand-AndersenEuropean Central Bank, Directorate General

StatisticsCCSA Special Session, Luxembourg, 8 September

2011

Communicating statistics to frequent users

“One size fits all?”

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Welfare enhancement

FACTUAL AND INDEPENDENT STATISTICS

Analysis & assessment

Policy options

Policy decisions

Policy validations

Analysis & assessment

Statistical and financial literacy CO

MM

UNICAT

ION

COM

MUNIC

ATIO

N COMM

UNICATION

COMM

UNICATION

Professional users and citizens Policy making

Communicating statistics creating a “culture of stability”

“Good statistics are much, much cheaper than

wrong decisions”Janez Potočnik,

European Commissioner for the Environment

Knowledge based society

Policy accountability

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One euro area One monetary policy One currency One statistics► ► ►

The EU ≥ 60 regional/minority languages By 40 million people

► A rich cultural & financial diversity

► Information overflow ► Information technology New demands ►and micro-statistics Budget ► awareness

17 euro area countries 331 million people 15 languages

Does one communication strategy fits all

purposes?

Communicating statistics creating a “culture of stability”

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Press releases Dissemination of statistics on ECB website (SDW)► ► Monthly bulletin E-mail hot-lines Video & games► ►

ECB statistics conferences inviting users of statistics (policy, academia, journalists) ECB speakers at conferences and seminars

Bilateral informal talks to external users and media

Press briefings on new statistics with journalists 1-2 seminars per year to explain statistics to journalists

ECB statistics communication activities

Does one communication strategy fit all ?

Statistics Data Warehouse (SDW) where all published statistics are freely available

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Extracting relevant statistics in

context (What?)

Form of communication,

using users’ language (How?)

Further explore existing

communication channels (Which?)

More focused market

segmentation (Who?)

One size fits all ?

Who are our frequent users ? ► Policy makers ► Media ► Financial intermediaries ► Research and higher education

Literature tells us: tailor statistics to user groups, channels, users language!

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Increase volumes, adjust search,

regrouping of new statistics, use of

tools and colours

One size fits all ?Evolution of communicating

statistics

Focussed on need for technical access to

statistics, IT, storage.

Statistics is disseminated

Ask users: work with synergies

of similar user patterns

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New communication initiatives

• Survey of user needs and functionalities (web-based and interviews)

• Work together with (sparring) partners from the private market

• Closer cooperation among international organisations, sharing tools

Provide a set of best practice and recommendations of new ideas to make statistics better understood, easier accessible and reach a larger audience

• Task Force on accessibility of statistics: A Eurosystem/ESCB concept

• Statistical competence centre – one stop shop of trustworthy statistics for all (crowing out bad statistics)

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New preliminary communication suggestions

Preliminary ideas (i)

Facilitate the access of official statistics by data vendor (Bloomberg /Thomsen-Reuters /Haver analy.)

Data vendors are re-distribution multipliers of (official) statistics and reach

financial intermediaries globally.

Provide tools and functionalities which are familiar to and daily used by

market analysts and financial researchers.

Ability of users to compare statistics from multiple sources and select data

and graphs within few “clicks”.

Large and high frequency volumes (“machine to machine” communication

facility and code mapping/translations ).

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New preliminary communication suggestions

Preliminary ideas (ii)

Workshops and training for media

Invite journalists to statistics workshops:

Provide an overview of the statistics system and how it works

Provide a conceptual overview of available statistics

Explain the statistics, objectives, provide examples for easy understanding

Demonstrate how to find statistics and to use available tools

Provide contact points to statistics for further references and for (non policy)

explanations and clarifications of statistics

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New preliminary communication suggestions

Preliminary ideas (iii)

Press releases – include facility to select the related statistics directly from press releases

Easy access to statistics and historical series

Easy for users to check for a statistics story: ability to compare latest statistics

with earlier values – is there a story to report this month ?

Easy to find additional related statistics for further explorations

Easy to compare corresponding national contributions and euro area statistics

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New preliminary communication suggestions

Preliminary ideas (iv)

Common language

Convert statistics into common language messages which make statistics

easy understood and therefore usable for laymen

Provide and assist laymen in converting statistics into common language

Provide direct links from common languages and statistics language

Provide statistics in multiple languages

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One size fits all ?Conclusions

Need to focus more on Communication of Statistics Ask frequent users for their needs (similar patterns) Focus on serving and supporting frequent usersThe more users understand statistics, the more use of statistics ►

statistics will contribute to a “culture of stability” acceptance ► ►of policy decisions trust in statistics & institutions►

Join for common synergies in serving frequent users !

Statistics is technically disseminated and available – progress is made with incremental upgrades (web 1.0 to web 2.0), add-ons

One euro area One monetary policy One currency One ► ► ►statistics ► One size fits all communication strategy?