Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) convened yesterday a Stakeholder meeting on 'Pushing the frontiers of statistics through partnerships', and launched the Ghana 2024 Statistical Yearbook overview.
The event aimed at building strong partnership between the public and private sector organisations, and promoting the use of data for policy planning to accelerate the country’s development.
It was attended by representatives from ministries, departments and agencies, as well as the UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), the UK's Office for National Statistics (ONS), Telecel Ghana, MTN Ghana, Flowminder, UN organisations, and journalists, among others
As part of this event, the Government Statistician, Professor Samuel K. Annim, presented some core findings from GSS' thematic brief on Population Mobility and Distributions in Ghana in 2024, produced under the Data for Good partnership between GSS, Flowminder and Telecel Ghana. This thematic brief will soon be released publicly.
GSS also signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Office of National Statistics (ONS) to extend further the partnership between the two organisations to help produce official data statistics to accelerate national development.
Sian Rasdale, from FCDO, commented on the importance of data and partnership building in her opening remarks:
The data we're going to hear about today is exactly the type of products that are being demanded. We're going to hear about fantastically innovative approaches. The way we are able to do more with the data, and be better with the data, and get the right data in the right place at the right time is by building partnerships and exploiting the whole range of data available. For the UK government, partnerships like this is exactly the way we want to be delivering; and in particular those partnerships that are working across all of the UK's assets, both FCDO and our support for Flowminder, and working really closely with the Office of National Statistics, but also working in much more in a partnership approach with you [Ghanaian parliamentarians] and the private system.
— Sian Rasdale, Chief statistician & Deputy Director of the Center for Data Analysis at FCDO
Jacquelyn Makumator-Jones, representing Telecel Ghana, highlighted in her speech the power of data and Telecel Ghana's vision for Data for Good partnership:
"It's a pleasure to be here today as we mark this significant milestone in our commitment to harnessing the power of technology for positive change. [...] Through this Data for good partnership, we are reaffirming our dedication to using data responsibly and ethically to address some of Ghana's most pressing challenges [...]. What we have now is the vision for our collaboration between us, the Ghana Statistical Service and Flowminder. By working together, we are ensuring that the insights generated from the data are used for informed policies, to support communities, and create solutions that will benefit all of us as Ghanaians".
— Jacquelyn Makumator-Jones, Telecel Ghana
The event was live streamed on GSS' Facebook page.
You can watch the recording here: