Mo Ibrahim Foundation |15 November 2019

Seychelles praised for meeting data collection targets

By Laura Pillay

Seychelles has been credited as one of four African countries who in 2018 met 80% or more of its criteria for the population and vital statistics data, according to ‘Agenda 2063 and 2030: Is Africa on Track?’, a report on African governance published by the Mo Ibrahim Foundation in October.

According to the report, Seychelles in 2018 met 87.5 percent of its data criteria, behind Nigeria with 90 percent and ahead of South Africa and Sierra Leone, both with 80 percent each, while eight countries, notably Angola, Côte d’Ivoire, Gabon, Madagascar, Sao Tome & Principe, Somalia, Sudan and Swaziland, met none of the criteria for data coverage.

The findings of the report have led to conclusions that data collection use by African governments is still insufficient to leave policymakers and potential investors adequately informed.

In an article dated October 31 by David Whitehouse, the executive director of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation Nathalie Delapalme is said to have praised the government of Seychelles for understanding the importance of data, and making a political commitment to financing it, noting the importance of good quality data as the basis for sound and more efficient public policy in health, education, employment, financial services and voting.

As per the Open Data Watch’s Open Data Inventory (ODIN) which assesses the coverage and openness of national statistics, Seychelles is also one of three African countries, alongside Egypt and Mauritius to have a death registration system that covers 90% or more of the population on account of the inability of some countries to collect data in a regular and timely manner, despite increased participation in censuses and household surveys and the use of technology.

Within the local context, population and vital statistics data are collected by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), established in 1980 as the statistics division. Over the years, the entity has changed ministries and undergone several changes, including having the parent act changed to its current version, the National Bureau of Statistics Act 2010.

Data and statistics collected and compiled by the bureau include tourism, exchange rates, employment, demography and productions and merchandise trade statistics among others.

Seychelles NATION had a brief chat with the chief executive of NBS, Laura Ahtime, who outlined the bureau’s functions and the findings of the report.

Seychelles NATION: Why is it important to collect population and vital statistics data and what type of data does NBS collect in this capacity?

CEO Ahtime: People are at the core of every country’s development as they make up one of the most important economic resources of a country. They are the asset of a country, in that they provide the labour component of the factors of production that is necessary to put into motion the wheels of development.

In any democratic society, people and their well-being come first, and therefore knowledge of the stock of the people, their demographic and socio-economic characteristics and their distribution within the economic territory are crucial, hence the need to have credible and timely data on population count, and vital statistics.

It is for this reason that countries are encouraged to conduct a nation-wide Population & Housing Census (PHC) every ten years to take stock of the people, their characteristics, composition, distribution and other important information needed for policy and decision-making. Information on housing and housing condition including availability of amenities and assets are also collected in a PHC to assess living conditions.

In Seychelles the last PHC was conducted in 2010 and the next one is due in 2020. Many things happen within ten years such as new developments, internal mobility, demographic and socio-economic transformations, among others. All these changes mean that information should be updated periodically, and in the case of a census which is a complete count of everyone, this should be done during a limited window of time which is often referred to as taking a snapshot of the population at a particular point in time.

Since a census requires mobilising significant resources (human and financial) and is a very costly exercise, its frequency is usually every ten years and in the intercensal years, statistical offices use vital statistics and migration data to update the population count.

Population data collected comprise: Name, national identity number (NIN), date of birth (DOB), sex, education level, marital status, relationship to head of household, nationality, religion, district of residence, work status, occupation, industry, whether any individual has any “limited functionality” (previously known as disability) among others.

The section on housing focuses on tenure, housing condition, availability of amenities among others.

The census questionnaire usually has a basic core set of questions at each round and other questions are added to meet new demands and also to take into account major transformations that happen over the years.

Data collected from a Population & Housing Census constitutes a rich and comprehensive source of data about the people in any country.

Seychelles NATION: What is the data used for or who is interested in accessing such data?

CEO Ahtime: Any government should have a good knowledge of the stock of its people and where they are. The tag line of the SDG Agenda 2030 says ‘leave no one behind’. If a government has no notion of the size of its people within the economic territory, their status and living conditions, how can it guarantee that it has not left anyone behind? Everyone counts and everyone should be counted.

The data is therefore collected so that it can be used to make decisions and formulate policies to improve the lives of the people. Major users are government, parliamentarians who are interested in having a better knowledge of their constituency in order to focus their attention on addressing any problematic issues affecting their constituents, donor agencies, international and regional organisations, as well government authorities who are mandated to report on their commitments to international and regional agendas. Students and researchers can make use of this information for case studies or other academic work and any other individual interested in the data are free to make use of it.

Seychelles NATION:Has NBS always met the 80 percent criteria?

CEO Ahtime: In as far as population and vital statistics is concerned, Seychelles ranks highly within Africa where availability of data is concerned, and it is fair to say that we have met, and even exceeded, the 80 percent criteria. The bureau makes use of administrative source data from the civil status office for vital registration (births and deaths) and migration data from immigration records to update the population figures during the intercensal years.

Seychelles NATION: Recently, NBS has started collecting data about youth employment trends and for persons who are functionally limited. Why?

CEO Ahtime: The NBS has been conducting Quarterly Labour Force Surveys since 2014. Data for youth has always been available, and always published in the Quarterly bulletins. Within these quarterly publications, information is provided for the national population and a few youth-specific indicators are also published. We cannot make the national bulletin too long, otherwise information (such as that relating to youth) might get lost within the publication. So it is sometimes important to make separate publications to focus on separate issues, as we have done this past quarter.

We have now come to a point where the data series that we have, allows for zooming in on the youth population. We have developed a good working collaboration with the department of employment and are aware of their needs and interest in obtaining more data on the youth sub group. So the production of a bulletin specifically for the youth provides more data about this specific group, which otherwise will not be published within the usual national quarterly bulletin.

In addition to the youth, the functionally impaired population is also a vulnerable group for which labour market statistics is available. The bureau started collecting data for this group as of quarter 3 of 2018, to honour our obligation to collect data for SDG 8, more specifically, indicator 8.5.2 (Unemployment rate, by sex, age and persons with disabilities). However, producing data for the SDG should not be the only reason why we are producing this data. We aim to sensitise local stakeholders on the importance of collecting data for the functionally impaired, and how to make use of this data, to gain a better perspective on the experience of the functionally impaired, in the labour market. The bureau has held dissemination workshops in the past, to discuss the labour market indicators with stakeholders, and we intend to keep holding such sessions, with the aim of raising awareness on the subject, and to discuss how to interpret such data.

So now that the NBS has zoomed in on the youth and functionally limited subgroup, we intend to keep the ball rolling by continuously producing these publications, and to perhaps zoom in on other groups in the population (for example, women), all depending on data demand / needs.

Seychelles NATION: What guarantees and safeguards are in place towards ensuring the data collected is reliable and valid?

CEO Ahtime: One of the safeguards put in place is the move to electronic data capture. Data collection for some surveys (Quarterly Labour Force Surveys, Tourism Survey) is now fully automated, meaning the questionnaire is administered using the Computer Assisted Personal Interviewing (CAPI) technique, via tablets. Each enumerator carries his or her own tablet on the field.

The advantage of using this method is that it reduces survey errors, such as enumerators not following skip patterns, and then missing out on important questions. With CAPI, there is no chance of enumerators not following skip patterns, as the skip pattern is in-built and automatic, meaning they only see the questions relating to the circumstance of the individual being interviewed.

Another advantage with electronic data capture, is that it reduces the errors that may arise with data processing. When using paper questionnaires, data processing happens in four stages. This includes coding, two rounds of data entry, and a process called ‘Verification’ where data entered in stage one is compared to data entered in stage two. In the event of mismatch, the data entry clerk goes back to the questionnaire to see which is the right answer and then makes the correction. This data comparison process is done after data entry, as the very process of data entry is prone to error. If data entry is kept at one stage only, there will be no way to know if there has been errors in data entry, but with two rounds of data entry, followed by the verification process, data entry errors are easily identified and corrected. With tablets, data entry is not needed, so this whole step is skipped, and data entry error is thus not an issue. There is also a time-saving factor when surveys are conducted digitally instead of using paper questionnaires.

For those surveys where paper questionnaires are still being used, the data entry stages and verification stage still apply. Staff who do the data analysis also carry out statistical tests to evaluate the reliability and validity of their data, and for recent studies, such as the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI), these tests are reported within the publications.

Seychelles NATION: What are the challenges in data collection and thefindings of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation report?

CEO Ahtime: Data collection, especially primary data collection anywhere in the world is costly and has many challenges. It requires a lot of time to prepare the whole process from beginning to end which includes coordination of logistics across the entire economic territory. Depending on the scale and scope of the exercise, the cost of the data collection exercise being undertaken can vary.

The conduct of the survey or census will include among others, deciding what is to be collected and designing the data collection tool (paper based or electronic questionnaire), training the staff who are to administer the tool to the respondent, testing the tool by conducting a ‘pilot survey’ so that any issues encountered are rectified prior to the main enumeration exercise, demarcation of geographical boundaries within districts, preparation of maps to facilitate the identification of structures on the ground, equitable distribution of the workload and close supervision and monitoring of the processes in the field to ensure that the information collected is of quality and is credible and that there is proper coverage.

How the ratings have been done and the scores assigned are not very clear. Nonetheless, Seychelles has been rated fairly highly in the findings of the Mo Ibrahim report. An overall positive picture as far as data and statistics are concerned. This goes to show that albeit having a small statistical office, important information about the population and vital statistics is being collected regularly by the bureau and is available to all who wish to make use of it. Information is power.