Chief Executive in the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning says information on labour force enables governments to assess current economic activities, poverty levels, employment and gender as well as active population in the informal sector.

Mr. Mosito Khethisa was addressing statisticians from Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries who have converged in Maseru on Monday, for a five day workshop on Household Surveys and Measurement of Labour Force (HSMLF).

He said the workshop will sharpen skills of statisticians especially labour statisticians in the design, collection, analysis as well as dissemination of labour force data.

In addition, he said statistics help governments to make informed decisions in the area of employment creation and poverty reduction.

This type of survey, he said is conducted regularly after the population census with the aim of cross-checking the census results.

Meanwhile, Mr. Khethisa stated that the workshop came at the right time when statistical world has prioritised evidence based policy making, whereby public policy decisions should be informed by careful analysis using sound and transparent data.

On the other hand he said “We are all witnesses to the rapid growth of the informal economy, particularly in the SADC region.”

He therefore urged for improvements in the relations between producers and users of statistics for optimal utilisation of limited resources noting that, this will lead to drastic improvements in key datasets for Millennium Development Goals (MDG's).

At the end of the workshop, all SADC countries will have a clear and standardised concepts, definitions and methodologies towards production of labour force data.

Participants are statisticians from Lesotho, Botswana, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Malawi, Mozambique and Madagascar respectively.

The workshop is funded by United Nations in collaboration with SADC.

Source: LENA 15/04/2008