Asia-Pacific Stats Café Series: ESCAP Committee on Statistics: Fit for the future (2nd session)

As Singapore’s Chief Statistician, Dr. Koh Eng Chuan has steered the Department of Statistics (DOS) on its transformation journey to be the first stop for data and data services for Whole-of-Government (WOG), national, and international users. DOS is the Capability Centre of Individual and Business Data, and continuously benchmark against best practices of the advanced and reputable national statistical organizations as well as leading companies in the private sector.

Under Dr. Koh’s guidance, DOS tailored demand-driven data products for specific user groups, including enabling data access through the Anonymised Microdata Access Programme for in-depth analyses of socio-economic issues by researchers, providing businesses with data tools with curated and contextualized content for data-driven decision-making, and enhancing DOS’s digital services for the general public. Dr. Koh has also established the Digital Transformation Unit to drive innovations in Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning, scaling applications to benefit WOG. One such example is the development of the DOS Intelligent Classification Engine (DICE) for statistical classifications which leverages large-language model.

To uplift the competency of the statistical community, Dr. Koh drives the establishment and growth of the DOS Academy. This serves to equip and upskill statisticians and WOG officers in statistical capabilities, and also to consolidate and recognize the technical and specialized data skills of government statisticians.

At the international level, Dr. Koh is a Bureau member of the UN ESCAP’s Committee on Statistics.

Ms Rachael Beaven has over thirty years of experience in government statistics, in particular data preparation and analysis.  She has also worked extensively with governments, multilateral agencies and the statistical community, most notably through the United Nations Statistics Division, ECA, ESCAP, World Bank and Paris21.

Ms. Beaven has provided a wide range of technical support, from improving economic and financial statistics to estimating local population using geospatial data.  She is one of the founders of the Inclusive Data Charter, launched at the 2018 High-Level Political Forum, to mobilize political commitments and to advance inclusive and disaggregated data.  Ms. Beaven also led a programme on monitoring the Sustainable Development Goals with United Nations Statistics Division and established a data science hub with the Office for National Statistics of the United Kingdom to explore use of data science, in particular geospatial as well as big data, to monitor progress.

Ms. Beaven holds Master’s degrees in Statistical Applications in Business and Government as well as Business Administration, and a Bachelor’s degree in Geography and Geology.

Mr. Gogita Todradze is the Executive Director of National Statistics Office of Georgia (GEOSTAT) from May 2018.

Since 2002 he has been working at various positions in the National Statistics Office of Georgia (GEOSTAT). In 2010-2016, he was Head of the Business Statistics Division, while in 2016 - 2018 he occupied the position of Deputy Executive Director.

Since November 2017 he is a member of the Business Statistics Expert Group of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and since 2019, a member of the United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC). 2020 - 2022 he was elected as the Chair of the Bureau of the Committee on Statistics of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UN ESCAP).

Gogita Todradze has higher education qualifications in the field of Economics (Statistics) and legal studies. Since 2006 he holds the degree of Ph.D. in economics. He also speaks English, German, and Russian languages.

Gary Dunnet is currently Statistics New Zealand’s Deputy Chief Methodologist and has over 35 years’ experience as an official statistician. Gary has primarily worked at Statistics NZ, but has had stints in the NSI’s of Ireland and Australia. While he has spent most of this time as a methodologist, he has worked in many parts of an NSI (incl. subject matter (National Accounts, Census), planning, IT, and dissemination). In recent times, Gary has been on the SingStat Strategic Advisory Panel and is currently on the Statistics Centre of Abu Dhabi equivalent committee.

Gary is very active in the international community, where he is currently on the IAOS Executive Board and coordinator of the IAOS Young Statistician Prize; he is also on the HLG-MOS Exec Board and chair of the HLG-MOS Applying Data Science and Modern Methods to Official Statistics work-stream; a member of the Chief Methodologists Network and an active participant in the UN ESCAP community and NZ statistical community. Gary is passionate about the development of technical staff and innovation within the statistical system and processes.