Statistics New Zealand
Encyclopedia
Statistics New Zealand is the national statistical office of New Zealand
.
who serves as a member of the New Zealand House of Representatives
and holds several other posts within government. The chief executive officer of the agency has the formal title of 'Government Statistician' and this position is currently held by Geoff Bascand
. The department employs people with a variety of skills, including statisticians, mathematicians, computer science specialists, accountants, economists, demographers, sociologists, geographers, social psychologists, and marketers. One estimate is that the agency has 850 full time employees. A second estimate is that there were over 900 staff in 2000.
There are seven organisational subgroups each managed by a Deputy Government Statistician:
Many of the agencies powers, duties, and responsibilities are governed by acts of the New Zealand Parliament. The agency is an officially a state sector organisation
of New Zealand operating under the authority of the Statistics Act 1975.
every five years (in years ending in 1 or 6). The census is officially done on one day -- the most recent census was on 7 March 2006. The count of usual residents (excluding visitors from overseas) on this day was 4.027.947; they lived in 1,471,746 private occupied dwellings; their median age was 36 years (half older, half younger); 565,329 identified themselves as "Maori"; people had a median net income of $24,400. This is a main source of information, and data collected from this census is often used for further purposes within the department as well as serving as benchmark information for numerous reports and surveys. For example, the census asks about the main means of travel to work, but by combining this with data from transport surveys, the department can issue detailed reports such as "Commuting Patterns in New Zealand: 1996-2006", with specific inferences such as "Over half of people who walked or jogged to work lived within 2km of their workplace." This information is helpful for business purposes, government decision making, media purposes, foreign policy, journalism, public information, planning, and for many other uses. For example, the Federal Reserve Bank of New Zealand uses statistics from this agency about prices and wages to help develop economic indicators, exchange rate information, and the official cash rate.
The department supplies a wide variety of information. It reports on labour costs, incomes, civil unions and marriages, employment, electronic card transactions, food prices, retail trade, births and deaths, prices of capital goods, overseas trade, screen industry, international visitor arrivals, overseas merchandise, agriculture and fish stocks, water resources, building consents, electronic card transactions, English language providers, wholesale trade, local authority information, balance of payments data, manufacturing surveys, commuting patterns, mapping trends, culture and identity statistics, housing trends, work stoppages, gross domestic product, industrial energy use, and the list goes on and on. In addition, it analyzes trends and publishes forecasts. The agency does not involve itself with political polling generally.
The agency provides information to the public. Many surveys and reports are available free of charge on its website; users can download spreadsheets electronically. In addition, some private market research firms use the agency's vast database information as source material, combining it with value-added presentational software (such as sophisticated mapping programs), and then sell the re-packaged information.
Information from demographers is used as source material by journalists for articles. Sometimes statistics can influence public policy. For example, Statistics New Zealand demographers in 2008 spotted a trend of fewer women having children and wrote: "Deciding not to have children happens as a consequence of other life events.... Education, career, mortgages, changes in family and partners for many couples, childlessness is what happens while they are making other plans." Their report was picked up by journalists at the Sunday Star-Times to form the basis of an article with the headline "New Zealand women stop having babies". The article discussed ramifications, such as possible workforce shortages and increased cost of elderly care, as well as possible policy actions such as a "Working For Families" program. Newspaper headlines can influence public opinion which may impact policy decisions. Statistics New Zealand information is used by government to explore tough problems; a research paper dated April 2009 used agency statistics when exploring how to handle gang violence.
Agency data is quoted by a wide variety of sources, even in the footnotes of books. For example, in "Connecting the Clouds - the Internet in New Zealand", author Keith Newman cites agency statistics regarding telecommunications cost decreases (the Stats NZ report said "New Zealand average residential phone call pricing plummeted 50% between 1987 and 1993") and national finances (the Stats NZ report said "The current account deficit for the year ended March 2007 was $13.9 billion (8.5 percent of GDP)"). Data is used to help retailers spot trends and act accordingly. A newspaper article on decreased do-it-yourself (DIY) retail spending in 2008 quoted an agency source: "Figures from Statistics New Zealand show DIY spend has been tracking down with the retail sector." This information helps businesses adjust to new realities. Radio programmes such as "Radio New Zealand National" have quoted agency data.
The agency encourages use of statistics by the media by offering awards to journalists who use its data intelligently. Each year, two awards for "best use of statistics in a story" are presented with cash prizes of NZ$1,500 and $750.
Some agency policies result in controversy. One gay activist felt Statistics New Zealand was "breaking the law" by omitting a question on the 2006 census regarding sexual orientation; the article in the New Zealand Herald elaborated "Mr van Wetering and the Office of Human Rights Proceedings, the independent legal branch of the commission, expect to discuss the inclusion of the (sexual orientation) question in the 2011 Census with lawyers for Statistics New Zealand later this year." There were some indications that the agency was seriously considering including a question on sexual orientation. The agency did focus groups exploring this possibility. Sometimes controversies involve disputes over whether agency data was cited properly. One blogger, claiming to be a former Wellingtonian journalist who identifies himself or herself as "Poneke", accused the Sunday Star-Times of publishing misleading data about crime statistics. Poneke noted that “Statistics New Zealand now provide(s) the ability to query the New Zealand Police Statistics – allowing you to gather detailed crime information about your local area since 1994.” The blogger felt the agency was "impeccably impartial", but distrusted various media sources.
One way the agency makes data available to the public is by offering a Table Builder tool. It lets users access specific information from past surveys. For example, it's possible to "build" a table about population changes in the Wellington region of married persons using Table Builder -- married Wellingtonians (not separated) increased in number from 148,014 (in 2001) to 151,884 (2006). Further, of the 151,884 in the year 2006, 648 lived in the Lambton section. Essentially it allows users to efficiently retrieve specific information from past surveys and censuses. It's a quick way to retrieve counts and permits what some market researchers call "breakdowns". Columns can be chosen; rows can be chosen; and a table can be pulled together filtered by different variables. The agency does not yet offer end-users the capability to directly mine raw data to generate new statistics. Perhaps in the future users will have the power to access a virtual database of updated census counts, that is, to access a virtual database created "as if the census was taken when the table was being pulled together" -- and by using filters, weighting, projections, and easy-to-use software tools, create data which describes "what's happening now". In the example, with such capabilities, one could say how many married (never-separated) Wellingtonians living in Lambton there were "right now". Further, projections could be made. But there is no evidence in the Statistics New Zealand website that such a capability is yet offered, but it is possible this may happen in the future.
The following counts were derived by using Statistics New Zealand's Table Builder tool:
Statistics New Zealand develops statistical classifications and standards, and works with the corresponding national statistical offices with such nations as Australia, the United States, and Canada. It conducts ongoing research regarding the viability of these standards. Since the early 2000s, it has begun using the Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupation to describe a wide variety of jobs; for example, the code 111111 describes a chief executive or managing director, while the code 531111 describes a general clerk. By using standardized codes, high speed computers can sift and sort through large databases to produce summary reports.
It also provides technical assistance to developing countries in the Pacific rim, with a special focus on Pacific Island nations.
Statistics New Zealand is acknowledged as the statistical authority within government. While other branches of government generate statistics, Statistics New Zealand works with them to expedite the information as well as provide consulting services when appropriate. It is responsible for the first integrated programme of Official Social Statistics. It provides assistance, guidance and oversight to other government agencies regarding statistics when appropriate. For example, it works with the New Zealand Health Information Service regarding their management of statistical information - a downloaded spreadsheet showed there were 65,120 live births registered in 2007 in the nation, and the table listed Statistics New Zealand as a source of this information. It worked with the Ministry for Culture and Heritage to collect and publish cultural data.
In its statement of intent, it lists statistical excellence, integrity, confidentiality and data security, leading, connecting, and communicating as its values. It says on its website: "Our highest priority is to produce relevant, accurate, and timely data with useful in-depth analysis. We aim to continually improve our technical and quality standards to foster a professional organisation and provide leadership for the Official Statistics System."
Confidentiality isn't only a policy chosen by the department, but required by law. A section of the Statistics Act 1975 reads "No information from an individual schedule is to be separately published or disclosed [Section 37(3)], except as authorised by the Statistics Act (the Act permits others to see information from an individual schedule, but only when it is in a form that prevents identification of the respondent concerned, and then only under strict security conditions). This means government can't abuse personal information from a census by revealing (or threating to reveal it) for dubious purposes. A particular person's income responses can't be handed over to a tax collection agency, for example.
The agency maintains an open copyright policy stating that "information obtained from Statistics New Zealand may be freely used, reproduced, or quoted unless otherwise specified" with the caveat that "in all cases Statistics New Zealand must be acknowledged as the source."
A training program was established to encourage college graduates to consider a career at the agency. This program is called the Graduate Leadership Development Programme (gLDP, sometimes gDLP). It features social and technical support networks, monthly workshops, peer-mentoring, action learning groups, team corporate projects, and rotations through different departments. It seeks graduates skilled at communicating and analyzing and working with people, and hires approximately ten to fifteen graduates each year.
can get complex. The agency has statisticians and mathematicians and survey experts whose chief duty is to examine how the agency approaches various projects and to suggest ways to improve efficiency, speed, and accuracy.
Some projects require advanced statistical tools to make sense of misleading data. For example, sometimes seasonality distorts data. "For example, in retail trade, December is a very high month due to Christmas sales. If we compare November sales with December sales, we would report an increase in sales. But this increase is largely due to seasonal fluctuations and is not an informative measure" according to a description from their website. To prevent seasonal variables from distorting data, statisticians sometimes use complex programs, including X-12-ARIMA (derived from census bureaus from the US and Canada), to remove seasonal distortions. So, with the December sales bump removed, the seasonally-adjusted retail sales data can reveal the true underlying trend -- are sales going up, holding steady, or declining? This is important information for retailers.
While the census counts every person, the department also conducts surveys
based on only a small sample of people. These samples are scientifically selected to represent the larger group. For example, the General Social Survey chooses a select number of households, approximately 8,000, which represent the nation as a whole, and will survey them every two years; the first results of this survey will be available in October 2009. Interviewers with laptops conduct face-to-face interviews, and the result is information about "social wellbeing" including "housing, health, paid work, social connectedness, and human rights".
It sometimes conducts specialty surveys about a specific industry or topic. For example, it published a biotechnology survey, based on a 10-page questionnaire developed by the agency, using scientific samples to choose respondents; the 2007 results can be downloaded to computers via the Internet. This particular report uses a long list of variables, such as "total exports" and "biotechnology exports to Asia" and "stage of development of biotechnology processes".
Statistical techniques such as sampling
and weighting can reduce data gathering expenses while surveying, although it requires careful attention by statisticians. For example, census counts are rather straightforward in a statistical sense since it's a straight count of bodies, purchases, opinions, actions. But it is expensive to interview everybody. And there are many non-census topics requiring further study which the agency is asked to do. One way to reduce costs is by selecting smaller samples which hopefully represent the population being studied. This is a highly cost-effective way to get accurate information. Choosing a good sample sometimes requires complex statistical work to make sure the sample is, indeed, truly representative of the population under study. If conditions do not permit representative sampling but known benchmark statistics are known (possibly from earlier census data), it's still possible to generate accurate information by weighting the data to distort it back, so to speak, to compensate for the distortion caused by the unrepresentative sample. For example, suppose an area of Wellington has a known percentage of women -- say 53% -- which is believed to be accurate from a previous census count; a study is done a few years later; a sample is chosen; questionnaires are processed; but of the returning questionnaires, 57% are women. It's possible statistically to give men slightly greater weight to account for the discrepancy, and the result is more accurate data. The agency discusses different methodologies on its website. A statement explains why weighting is sometimes necessary: "Statistics New Zealand is improving the methodology used for the 2001 Household Economic Survey through the use of integrated weighting. This is a relatively recently developed method of adjusting the statistical output of a survey to match population benchmarks. In particular, it takes account of undercoverage in the survey of specified population groups. Integrated weighting improves the robustness and accuracy of survey estimates. It also reduces the effect of bias in estimates resulting from undercoverage, as well as reducing the level of sampling error for benchmark variables."
All statistical work presents opportunities for error, but it's possible to reduce error to manageable amounts. A statement reads: "An important aim of our ongoing work is to understand, manage, control and report on all known sources of error... which simply reflect the inherent variability that exists among the units we are seeking to measure... This variability manifests itself in sampling error when we use samples for cost-effectiveness reasons to estimate characteristics about a population. Sampling errors are relatively easy to measure.... Other sources reflect process, measurement and inference errors, and are referred to as non-sampling error. It is not possible to eliminate all sources of error. However, our continued efforts at understanding and managing variability and error ensure we are exercising a high level of control on all known sources of error."
What greatly facilitates statistical accuracy by reducing non-response bias is that answering questions is sometimes required by law. Some surveys must be answered. This requirement lessens agency expense, practically eliminates non-response bias (a perennial headache for most private market researchers), and improves accuracy. For example, for the General Social Survey, people are selected randomly for 10-minute phone interviews which sometimes ask personal questions such as wage and salary information. But people must answer these questions and won't be paid for their time. It's required by the Statistics Act 1975. This policy is substantially different from countries such as the United States, where answering official surveys is rarely compulsory, including responding to its census which is done every ten years. Further, if a person doesn't get a census survey for any reason, he or she is still obligated to visit a local census bureau, get one, fill it out, and return it; the government can't be held accountable for mixing up an address. Questionnaires can be downloaded from the Internet via the Statistics New Zealand website. Legislation states census forms must be "filled in and signed within a stated time" and returned "within a stated time to the Department". Mutilation or defacement of schedules can be punished. But fines for non-compliance rarely exceed $500.
Extensive use is made of the Internet to publish key information. Users can sift through vast databases to learn about a wide variety of topics. A user can learn that "89% of businesses use broadband to connect to the Internet" or that "145 babies were born on Mother's Day in 2008. Entire reports can be downloaded as .pdf files and printed on one's computer.
Management positions have changed over time as well. The post of Government Statistician was created in 1910 within the Registrar-General's Office, before a separate Census and Statistics Office was set up in 1913. Before 1910 most statistics for the colony or dominion as a whole were the responsibility of the Registrar-General himself.
The well-regarded economist J.B. Condliffe worked at the agency after First World War, but no fully qualified mathematicians until after the Second, when in-house training in statistical methods also began. Since 1910, the post of Government Statistician has been held by different persons. From 1955 until 1994 the agency was known as the Department of Statistics until the name was changed to the current one.
Government Statisticians
The agency has grown in size and sophistication from its early beginnings. As times change, information needs change accordingly. For example, in the late 1990s and early 2000s, politicians became interested in the concept of sustainable development
. The agency found ways to measure these trends to provide helpful information for planners. In August 2002, it published its first report on Sustainable Development Indicators, which measured variables such as water quality, energy usage, sustainability of cities, and youth development.
Environment Minister Marian Hobbs said in 2003 "...the growth we have must be sustained over a number of generations. Therefore, we need to plan for that growth so that we don't add to our problems." As the department moves into the future, and if the past is an indication of the future, it is likely to continue its trajectory of larger size, more responsibility, increased technical sophistication via Internet and broadband tools.
The 2011 national census was cancelled due to the disruption and displacement of people caused by the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake. The census has been rescheduled for March 2013. Government Statistician Geoff Bascand and Statistics Minister Maurice Williamson
are to decide the exact date for the Census, and the required legislation authorising it is to go to Parliament
later in 2011.
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
.
Organisation
New Zealand's Minister of Statistics is Maurice WilliamsonMaurice Williamson
Maurice Donald Williamson is a New Zealand politician, representing Pakuranga in the House of Representatives as a member of the National Party...
who serves as a member of the New Zealand House of Representatives
New Zealand House of Representatives
The New Zealand House of Representatives is the sole chamber of the legislature of New Zealand. The House and the Queen of New Zealand form the New Zealand Parliament....
and holds several other posts within government. The chief executive officer of the agency has the formal title of 'Government Statistician' and this position is currently held by Geoff Bascand
Geoff Bascand
Geoff Bascand is the Government Statistician of New Zealand and the Chief Executive of Statistics New Zealand. He was appointed to these positions on 22 May 2007.-Background:...
. The department employs people with a variety of skills, including statisticians, mathematicians, computer science specialists, accountants, economists, demographers, sociologists, geographers, social psychologists, and marketers. One estimate is that the agency has 850 full time employees. A second estimate is that there were over 900 staff in 2000.
There are seven organisational subgroups each managed by a Deputy Government Statistician:
- Macro-Economic and Environment Statistics studies prices, national accounts, develops macro-economic statistics, does government and international accounts, and ANZSIC 06 implementation (facilitating changeover to new classification code developed jointly with Australian statistics officials.)
- Social and Population Statistics studies population, social conditions, standard of living, census, and has a 2011 census planning manager as well as statisticians helping to develop new social statistics measures.
- Standards and Methods studies statistical methods, statistical education and research, solutions and capabilities, information management, and develops new methodologies.
- Collections and Dissemination services clients. There is one general manager in Christchurch and one in Auckland. It develops products and services, manages publishing and customer services.
- Organisation Direction maintains contacts with key government officials, does internal audits and business planning, manages international relations and the Official Statistics System (OSS), and advises on Maori affairs.
- Industry and Labour Statistics studies business indicators, finance and performance, agriculture, energy and work knowledge and skills.
- Organisation Development focuses on services for the agency itself, including information technology management, quality assurance, application development and support, finances, corporate support, and human resources.
Many of the agencies powers, duties, and responsibilities are governed by acts of the New Zealand Parliament. The agency is an officially a state sector organisation
State sector organisations in New Zealand
Public sector organisations in New Zealand include the State sector plus the organisations of local government.Within the State sector lies the State services, and within this, lies the core Public service....
of New Zealand operating under the authority of the Statistics Act 1975.
Responsibilities and activities
The department conducts the censusNew Zealand Census of Population and Dwellings
The New Zealand government department Statistics New Zealand conducts a census of population and dwellings every five years. The census scheduled for 2011 was cancelled due to circumstances surrounding the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake, however, and legislation introduced to hold the next...
every five years (in years ending in 1 or 6). The census is officially done on one day -- the most recent census was on 7 March 2006. The count of usual residents (excluding visitors from overseas) on this day was 4.027.947; they lived in 1,471,746 private occupied dwellings; their median age was 36 years (half older, half younger); 565,329 identified themselves as "Maori"; people had a median net income of $24,400. This is a main source of information, and data collected from this census is often used for further purposes within the department as well as serving as benchmark information for numerous reports and surveys. For example, the census asks about the main means of travel to work, but by combining this with data from transport surveys, the department can issue detailed reports such as "Commuting Patterns in New Zealand: 1996-2006", with specific inferences such as "Over half of people who walked or jogged to work lived within 2km of their workplace." This information is helpful for business purposes, government decision making, media purposes, foreign policy, journalism, public information, planning, and for many other uses. For example, the Federal Reserve Bank of New Zealand uses statistics from this agency about prices and wages to help develop economic indicators, exchange rate information, and the official cash rate.
The department supplies a wide variety of information. It reports on labour costs, incomes, civil unions and marriages, employment, electronic card transactions, food prices, retail trade, births and deaths, prices of capital goods, overseas trade, screen industry, international visitor arrivals, overseas merchandise, agriculture and fish stocks, water resources, building consents, electronic card transactions, English language providers, wholesale trade, local authority information, balance of payments data, manufacturing surveys, commuting patterns, mapping trends, culture and identity statistics, housing trends, work stoppages, gross domestic product, industrial energy use, and the list goes on and on. In addition, it analyzes trends and publishes forecasts. The agency does not involve itself with political polling generally.
The agency provides information to the public. Many surveys and reports are available free of charge on its website; users can download spreadsheets electronically. In addition, some private market research firms use the agency's vast database information as source material, combining it with value-added presentational software (such as sophisticated mapping programs), and then sell the re-packaged information.
Information from demographers is used as source material by journalists for articles. Sometimes statistics can influence public policy. For example, Statistics New Zealand demographers in 2008 spotted a trend of fewer women having children and wrote: "Deciding not to have children happens as a consequence of other life events.... Education, career, mortgages, changes in family and partners for many couples, childlessness is what happens while they are making other plans." Their report was picked up by journalists at the Sunday Star-Times to form the basis of an article with the headline "New Zealand women stop having babies". The article discussed ramifications, such as possible workforce shortages and increased cost of elderly care, as well as possible policy actions such as a "Working For Families" program. Newspaper headlines can influence public opinion which may impact policy decisions. Statistics New Zealand information is used by government to explore tough problems; a research paper dated April 2009 used agency statistics when exploring how to handle gang violence.
Agency data is quoted by a wide variety of sources, even in the footnotes of books. For example, in "Connecting the Clouds - the Internet in New Zealand", author Keith Newman cites agency statistics regarding telecommunications cost decreases (the Stats NZ report said "New Zealand average residential phone call pricing plummeted 50% between 1987 and 1993") and national finances (the Stats NZ report said "The current account deficit for the year ended March 2007 was $13.9 billion (8.5 percent of GDP)"). Data is used to help retailers spot trends and act accordingly. A newspaper article on decreased do-it-yourself (DIY) retail spending in 2008 quoted an agency source: "Figures from Statistics New Zealand show DIY spend has been tracking down with the retail sector." This information helps businesses adjust to new realities. Radio programmes such as "Radio New Zealand National" have quoted agency data.
The agency encourages use of statistics by the media by offering awards to journalists who use its data intelligently. Each year, two awards for "best use of statistics in a story" are presented with cash prizes of NZ$1,500 and $750.
Some agency policies result in controversy. One gay activist felt Statistics New Zealand was "breaking the law" by omitting a question on the 2006 census regarding sexual orientation; the article in the New Zealand Herald elaborated "Mr van Wetering and the Office of Human Rights Proceedings, the independent legal branch of the commission, expect to discuss the inclusion of the (sexual orientation) question in the 2011 Census with lawyers for Statistics New Zealand later this year." There were some indications that the agency was seriously considering including a question on sexual orientation. The agency did focus groups exploring this possibility. Sometimes controversies involve disputes over whether agency data was cited properly. One blogger, claiming to be a former Wellingtonian journalist who identifies himself or herself as "Poneke", accused the Sunday Star-Times of publishing misleading data about crime statistics. Poneke noted that “Statistics New Zealand now provide(s) the ability to query the New Zealand Police Statistics – allowing you to gather detailed crime information about your local area since 1994.” The blogger felt the agency was "impeccably impartial", but distrusted various media sources.
One way the agency makes data available to the public is by offering a Table Builder tool. It lets users access specific information from past surveys. For example, it's possible to "build" a table about population changes in the Wellington region of married persons using Table Builder -- married Wellingtonians (not separated) increased in number from 148,014 (in 2001) to 151,884 (2006). Further, of the 151,884 in the year 2006, 648 lived in the Lambton section. Essentially it allows users to efficiently retrieve specific information from past surveys and censuses. It's a quick way to retrieve counts and permits what some market researchers call "breakdowns". Columns can be chosen; rows can be chosen; and a table can be pulled together filtered by different variables. The agency does not yet offer end-users the capability to directly mine raw data to generate new statistics. Perhaps in the future users will have the power to access a virtual database of updated census counts, that is, to access a virtual database created "as if the census was taken when the table was being pulled together" -- and by using filters, weighting, projections, and easy-to-use software tools, create data which describes "what's happening now". In the example, with such capabilities, one could say how many married (never-separated) Wellingtonians living in Lambton there were "right now". Further, projections could be made. But there is no evidence in the Statistics New Zealand website that such a capability is yet offered, but it is possible this may happen in the future.
The following counts were derived by using Statistics New Zealand's Table Builder tool:
| Census year | Men | Women |
|---|---|---|
| 1996 | ||
| 2001 | ||
| 2006 | ||
Statistics New Zealand develops statistical classifications and standards, and works with the corresponding national statistical offices with such nations as Australia, the United States, and Canada. It conducts ongoing research regarding the viability of these standards. Since the early 2000s, it has begun using the Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupation to describe a wide variety of jobs; for example, the code 111111 describes a chief executive or managing director, while the code 531111 describes a general clerk. By using standardized codes, high speed computers can sift and sort through large databases to produce summary reports.
It also provides technical assistance to developing countries in the Pacific rim, with a special focus on Pacific Island nations.
Statistics New Zealand is acknowledged as the statistical authority within government. While other branches of government generate statistics, Statistics New Zealand works with them to expedite the information as well as provide consulting services when appropriate. It is responsible for the first integrated programme of Official Social Statistics. It provides assistance, guidance and oversight to other government agencies regarding statistics when appropriate. For example, it works with the New Zealand Health Information Service regarding their management of statistical information - a downloaded spreadsheet showed there were 65,120 live births registered in 2007 in the nation, and the table listed Statistics New Zealand as a source of this information. It worked with the Ministry for Culture and Heritage to collect and publish cultural data.
Vision
The departments vision is "an informed society using official statistics", hoping to be "your first source of information for making key decisions" and says on its website that it "leads the collection and publicising of key information on nearly everything."In its statement of intent, it lists statistical excellence, integrity, confidentiality and data security, leading, connecting, and communicating as its values. It says on its website: "Our highest priority is to produce relevant, accurate, and timely data with useful in-depth analysis. We aim to continually improve our technical and quality standards to foster a professional organisation and provide leadership for the Official Statistics System."
Confidentiality isn't only a policy chosen by the department, but required by law. A section of the Statistics Act 1975 reads "No information from an individual schedule is to be separately published or disclosed [Section 37(3)], except as authorised by the Statistics Act (the Act permits others to see information from an individual schedule, but only when it is in a form that prevents identification of the respondent concerned, and then only under strict security conditions). This means government can't abuse personal information from a census by revealing (or threating to reveal it) for dubious purposes. A particular person's income responses can't be handed over to a tax collection agency, for example.
The agency maintains an open copyright policy stating that "information obtained from Statistics New Zealand may be freely used, reproduced, or quoted unless otherwise specified" with the caveat that "in all cases Statistics New Zealand must be acknowledged as the source."
A training program was established to encourage college graduates to consider a career at the agency. This program is called the Graduate Leadership Development Programme (gLDP, sometimes gDLP). It features social and technical support networks, monthly workshops, peer-mentoring, action learning groups, team corporate projects, and rotations through different departments. It seeks graduates skilled at communicating and analyzing and working with people, and hires approximately ten to fifteen graduates each year.
Methods
Statistics New Zealand uses many methods to collect, process, analyze, and publish data. StatisticsStatistics
Statistics is the study of the collection, organization, analysis, and interpretation of data. It deals with all aspects of this, including the planning of data collection in terms of the design of surveys and experiments....
can get complex. The agency has statisticians and mathematicians and survey experts whose chief duty is to examine how the agency approaches various projects and to suggest ways to improve efficiency, speed, and accuracy.
Some projects require advanced statistical tools to make sense of misleading data. For example, sometimes seasonality distorts data. "For example, in retail trade, December is a very high month due to Christmas sales. If we compare November sales with December sales, we would report an increase in sales. But this increase is largely due to seasonal fluctuations and is not an informative measure" according to a description from their website. To prevent seasonal variables from distorting data, statisticians sometimes use complex programs, including X-12-ARIMA (derived from census bureaus from the US and Canada), to remove seasonal distortions. So, with the December sales bump removed, the seasonally-adjusted retail sales data can reveal the true underlying trend -- are sales going up, holding steady, or declining? This is important information for retailers.
While the census counts every person, the department also conducts surveys
Statistical survey
Survey methodology is the field that studies surveys, that is, the sample of individuals from a population with a view towards making statistical inferences about the population using the sample. Polls about public opinion, such as political beliefs, are reported in the news media in democracies....
based on only a small sample of people. These samples are scientifically selected to represent the larger group. For example, the General Social Survey chooses a select number of households, approximately 8,000, which represent the nation as a whole, and will survey them every two years; the first results of this survey will be available in October 2009. Interviewers with laptops conduct face-to-face interviews, and the result is information about "social wellbeing" including "housing, health, paid work, social connectedness, and human rights".
It sometimes conducts specialty surveys about a specific industry or topic. For example, it published a biotechnology survey, based on a 10-page questionnaire developed by the agency, using scientific samples to choose respondents; the 2007 results can be downloaded to computers via the Internet. This particular report uses a long list of variables, such as "total exports" and "biotechnology exports to Asia" and "stage of development of biotechnology processes".
Statistical techniques such as sampling
Sampling (statistics)
In statistics and survey methodology, sampling is concerned with the selection of a subset of individuals from within a population to estimate characteristics of the whole population....
and weighting can reduce data gathering expenses while surveying, although it requires careful attention by statisticians. For example, census counts are rather straightforward in a statistical sense since it's a straight count of bodies, purchases, opinions, actions. But it is expensive to interview everybody. And there are many non-census topics requiring further study which the agency is asked to do. One way to reduce costs is by selecting smaller samples which hopefully represent the population being studied. This is a highly cost-effective way to get accurate information. Choosing a good sample sometimes requires complex statistical work to make sure the sample is, indeed, truly representative of the population under study. If conditions do not permit representative sampling but known benchmark statistics are known (possibly from earlier census data), it's still possible to generate accurate information by weighting the data to distort it back, so to speak, to compensate for the distortion caused by the unrepresentative sample. For example, suppose an area of Wellington has a known percentage of women -- say 53% -- which is believed to be accurate from a previous census count; a study is done a few years later; a sample is chosen; questionnaires are processed; but of the returning questionnaires, 57% are women. It's possible statistically to give men slightly greater weight to account for the discrepancy, and the result is more accurate data. The agency discusses different methodologies on its website. A statement explains why weighting is sometimes necessary: "Statistics New Zealand is improving the methodology used for the 2001 Household Economic Survey through the use of integrated weighting. This is a relatively recently developed method of adjusting the statistical output of a survey to match population benchmarks. In particular, it takes account of undercoverage in the survey of specified population groups. Integrated weighting improves the robustness and accuracy of survey estimates. It also reduces the effect of bias in estimates resulting from undercoverage, as well as reducing the level of sampling error for benchmark variables."
What greatly facilitates statistical accuracy by reducing non-response bias is that answering questions is sometimes required by law. Some surveys must be answered. This requirement lessens agency expense, practically eliminates non-response bias (a perennial headache for most private market researchers), and improves accuracy. For example, for the General Social Survey, people are selected randomly for 10-minute phone interviews which sometimes ask personal questions such as wage and salary information. But people must answer these questions and won't be paid for their time. It's required by the Statistics Act 1975. This policy is substantially different from countries such as the United States, where answering official surveys is rarely compulsory, including responding to its census which is done every ten years. Further, if a person doesn't get a census survey for any reason, he or she is still obligated to visit a local census bureau, get one, fill it out, and return it; the government can't be held accountable for mixing up an address. Questionnaires can be downloaded from the Internet via the Statistics New Zealand website. Legislation states census forms must be "filled in and signed within a stated time" and returned "within a stated time to the Department". Mutilation or defacement of schedules can be punished. But fines for non-compliance rarely exceed $500.
Extensive use is made of the Internet to publish key information. Users can sift through vast databases to learn about a wide variety of topics. A user can learn that "89% of businesses use broadband to connect to the Internet" or that "145 babies were born on Mother's Day in 2008. Entire reports can be downloaded as .pdf files and printed on one's computer.
History
In the nation's early days, with a small population and before the advent of powered transportation and modern telecommunications, there was little need for statistics nor ability to create them. In the colonial years, sometimes magistrates and police officials collected data as part of their work. After about the 1890s, the official information source presented to the public was called the New Zealand Official Yearbook compiled from various departments. Sometimes data about animals were collected (a census of poultry ceased in 1971); one census taker on horseback drowned while crossing a river. In 1956, the newly-created Department of Statistics had 164 employees. Tabulating techniques improved. One source writes: "As both New Zealand's population and the complexity of the information sought grew, so did the size of the army of temporary clerks that was employed every five years by the Census and Statistics Office to process it. Sitting at long tables in large draughty or cramped rooms, they laboriously added, subtracted and calculated percentages. From the 1890s census data was written on cards which were sorted by hand. The drudgery of statistical work was gradually eased as adding and calculating machines and typewriters came into use, operated mostly by women. Tabulating machines were imported from the United States in the 1920s to process punched cards; this too was women's work," according to a book written by David Green in 2002. The agency grew in size. Tabulating machines were replaced by mainframe computers, then microcomputers, then the Internet. "Since the early 1980s computing has been done in-house, and in the 1990s personal computers and the Internet revolutionised the day-to-day experience of work at Statistics New Zealand," according to Green's book.Management positions have changed over time as well. The post of Government Statistician was created in 1910 within the Registrar-General's Office, before a separate Census and Statistics Office was set up in 1913. Before 1910 most statistics for the colony or dominion as a whole were the responsibility of the Registrar-General himself.
The well-regarded economist J.B. Condliffe worked at the agency after First World War, but no fully qualified mathematicians until after the Second, when in-house training in statistical methods also began. Since 1910, the post of Government Statistician has been held by different persons. From 1955 until 1994 the agency was known as the Department of Statistics until the name was changed to the current one.
Government Statisticians
- 1910 1911: W.M. Wright
- 1911 1932: Malcolm Fraser
- 1932 1946: James Butcher
- 1946 1958: George Wood
- 1958 1969: John V.T. Baker
- 1969 1973: John P. Lewin
- 1973 1980: E.A. Harris
- 1980 1984: John DarwinJohn Darwin (statistician)John Haddrick Darwin was Government Statistician of New Zealand from 1980 to 1984 and a member of the 1985–1986 Royal Commission on the Electoral System which recommended MMP. He was awarded Honorary Life Membership of the New Zealand Statistical Association in 2005.-Early life:He was born...
- 1984 1992: Steve KuzmicichSteve KuzmicichSteve Kuzmicich is a statistician from New Zealand and was Government Statistician of New Zealand from 1984 to 1992.-References:...
- 1992 1999: Len CookLen CookLeonard Warren "Len" Cook, CBE is a professional statistician who was Government Statistician of New Zealand from 1992 to 2000 and National Statistician and Director of the Office for National Statistics, United Kingdom, and Registrar General for England and Wales from 2000 to...
- 1999 2007: Brian PinkBrian PinkBrian Pink has been the Australian Statistician, the head of the Australian Bureau of Statistics , since 5 March 2007.Prior to September 1999, Brian Pink was ABS's Statistical Support Group Manager, when he was appointed as the Government Statistician for New Zealand and Chief Executive of...
- 2007 : Geoff BascandGeoff BascandGeoff Bascand is the Government Statistician of New Zealand and the Chief Executive of Statistics New Zealand. He was appointed to these positions on 22 May 2007.-Background:...
The agency has grown in size and sophistication from its early beginnings. As times change, information needs change accordingly. For example, in the late 1990s and early 2000s, politicians became interested in the concept of sustainable development
Sustainable development
Sustainable development is a pattern of resource use, that aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for generations to come...
. The agency found ways to measure these trends to provide helpful information for planners. In August 2002, it published its first report on Sustainable Development Indicators, which measured variables such as water quality, energy usage, sustainability of cities, and youth development.
Environment Minister Marian Hobbs said in 2003 "...the growth we have must be sustained over a number of generations. Therefore, we need to plan for that growth so that we don't add to our problems." As the department moves into the future, and if the past is an indication of the future, it is likely to continue its trajectory of larger size, more responsibility, increased technical sophistication via Internet and broadband tools.
The 2011 national census was cancelled due to the disruption and displacement of people caused by the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake. The census has been rescheduled for March 2013. Government Statistician Geoff Bascand and Statistics Minister Maurice Williamson
Maurice Williamson
Maurice Donald Williamson is a New Zealand politician, representing Pakuranga in the House of Representatives as a member of the National Party...
are to decide the exact date for the Census, and the required legislation authorising it is to go to Parliament
Parliament of New Zealand
The Parliament of New Zealand consists of the Queen of New Zealand and the New Zealand House of Representatives and, until 1951, the New Zealand Legislative Council. The House of Representatives is often referred to as "Parliament".The House of Representatives usually consists of 120 Members of...
later in 2011.
External links
- Statistics New Zealand
- Statisphere - Portal to New Zealand Official Statistics
- A brief illustrated history of Statistics New Zealand