Minister for Statistics and Programme Implementation D.V. Sadananda Gowda inaugurated the 8th Meeting of Heads of SAARC Statistical Organizations (SAARCSTAT) in New Delhi.
The three-day meeting was attended by delegates from SAARC Member States and other international organizations viz., FAO, PARIS 21, and ADB.
The theme of this Meeting was “Trade Statistics – Merchandise & Services”.
The Minister emphasized on greater regional cooperation for mutual development, to accelerate free trade in goods and services in the Region.
Reducing Asymmetry in Trade data amongst SAARC countries is one of the topics for discussion in this Meeting.
Reducing asymmetry in bilateral trade data is an issue which requires serious attention from the data compilers.
Although India has taken up the issues of data reconciliation with a few countries like China, Brazil, Vietnam, Philippines, South Korea, Japan, South Africa, Sri Lanka but much more needs to be done to bring down the asymmetry to an acceptable level especially in the SAARC Region.
It was also announced that India has decided to offer two slots to SAARC Member countries in Training Programmes conducted by the National Statistical Systems Training Academy.
