Create one office for data collection

THE national general election is around the corner and the PNG Electoral Commission needs funding.
The acting national statistician John Igitoi earlier informed the country of the deferral of the national census due to lack of funding.
Earlier on, the acting registrar-general of the national identification (NID) office asked for more funding.
These offices all deal with data collection of the country’s population; Electoral Commission for the electoral roll, NID for the registration of NID cards/birth certificates and National Statistical Office for the national census.
There are too many offices and it is expensive to run them, especially when they all come begging for funds.
I suggest the Government do a restructure and create an office specialising in data collection.
The data collected can then be shared by departments concerned for further analysis, interpretation or decision-making purposes.
Too many data collection centres will be expensive for the Govern.
We should focus on creating only one data collection centre.
Later on, more efficient and cost-effective ways of data collection can be employed.

Martin Amegao Goradim