Too many lies presented at meet

The National Letters

THE opening presentations by the Secretary for Treasury, Governor of the Bank of PNG, address by the Minister for National Planning and keynote address by the Prime Minister during the “PNG Development Forum” on Oct 18 organised by the Consultative Implementation and Monitoring Council leads me to ask a lot of questions about the credibility and authenticity of the addresses they made at this forum, particularly on the reliability of the statistical information they presented as the following events at the National Statistical Office prevails.
1. In 2008-2009 a “Household Income Expenditure Survey” was conducted at the tune of K15 million.
This survey was to (a) re-base the consumer price index (CPI) to properly monitor the basic household goods and services price movements; and (b) to profile the country’s first ever “Poverty Profile”. It is over 8 years and the latter has never been produced while the CPI was re-based in 2014, IS regressing it back to 2012.
2. In 2010, the “National Housing and Population Census” was to be conducted to take head count of every person in the country but was conducted in 2011 at a cost of K150 million, breaking the usual ten-year cycle.
This made analysis difficult hence Volume II of the Population Policy is not produced as it is difficult to analyse.  What a waste of resources!
3. In 2014 a “Census of Business Activities” was conducted yet again by NSO for over K7 million. Despite only less than 25 per cent responded to this census, the 2006 – 2013 GDP figures were estimated and released for use. It is statistically useless and does not portray the reality.
4. NSO was again tasked to collect bio-data of all citizens in 2014 at a cost of massive K250 million.
Thus far, only less than 500,000 people are registered and there is no possibility of ever registering everybody soon.
There is not one single report on Ialibu/Pangia, Alotau and NCD registration exercises at NSO or Civil Registry Office.
This would have alleviated identity theft including common roll up-dates, among others.
Note that the population census is usually conducted in only seven days across the breadth and width of the country. Registration is only for PNG citizens but seems endless with massive funding.
The forum presenters and the Prime Minister were misled by a lot of statistical lies.

Statistician who knows, Via email