DevLab Seminar with Torsten Figueiredo Walter

Hosted by DevLab at NYU Abu Dhabi

Date: Wednesday, December 8, 2021

Time: 8:45 AM-9:45 AM Eastern Time

Speaker:

• Torsten Figueiredo Walter (NYUAD) presents On the Microfoundations of National Statistics in Sub-Saharan Africa (joint work with Niclas Moneke (Oxford))

Abstract:

National statistics are essential for policy, business and research. Policymakers and private agents use national statistics to inform resource allocation decisions and policy design, researchers use national statistics as inputs to the study of economic processes.

In Sub-Saharan Africa, national statistics are commonly perceived to be of low quality, but systematic evidence of this is scarce. Therefore, the magnitude of errors in national statistics as well as their effects on research findings and policy analysis remain unknown. This project aims to take a first step towards filling this gap.

We propose a systematic approach to measure the extent to which national statistics are consistent with each other in Sub-Saharan Africa. We start from the observation that two concurrently conducted, nationally representative surveys should not yield statistically significantly different estimates of a given population parameter. To put this proposition to an empirical test, we gather all available individual and household survey (e.g., DHS, LSMS, MICS) and census micro data from Sub-Saharan Africa from the 1980s until today and compare statistical indicators derived from different survey instruments within countries over time. Then, we explore the causes of the uncovered discrepancies and their implications for policy and research.

RSVP:

The seminar is for researchers and academics interested in Development topics. If you are interested in joining the seminar, please email us at devlab@nyu.edu.