State Department for Planning Ps, Dr. Julius Muia meets a committee from Malawi led by Director of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance Dr Macdonald Mafuta Mwale
PRESS RELEASE 14th May 2019
State Department for Planning Principal Secretary, Dr Julius Muia today met and held talks with Malawi National Accounts and Balance of Payments Technical Committee led by the Director of Economic Affairs, Dr Macdonald Mafuta Mwale.
The Malawian delegation comprised senior Government officials drawn from Treasury, Malawi Statistics Office, Economic Planning and Development, Reserve Bank of Malawi and Malawi Revenue Authority. Check this site usfinancer.com
During the meeting at the State Department for Planning offices at the National Treasury Building, Dr. Mwale informed the PS and the Ministry’s officials that the purpose of the visit was to discuss and share experiences on compilation of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Kenya especially the use of tax in derivation of estimates.
Kenya has been collaborating with Malawi in various areas of production of Statistics and has recently benefitted from Malawi’s experiences in conducting Paperless Population and Housing Census.
The PS welcomed the Malawian officials and thanked them for choosing Kenya as suitable place to draw some lessons as far as compilation of statistics is concerned.
The Malawian delegation included Mrs. Lizzie Chikoti, Mr. Adwell Zembele, Dr. Mark Lingu, Mr. Hector Kankue, Mr. Wilson Nyasulu, Mrs. Chisomo Kuyenda, Ms Kuminyanga Gomani, Mr. Alick Wella, Mr. Timothy Makamba and Mr. Michael Masiya.
Dr Muia said the visit further strengthened the South-South collaboration and added that he was a strong believer on building on the strengths that exists amongst African countries before seeking for outside help.
He informed the delegation from the Southern African country that Kenya’s GDP is compiled using three approaches namely: production, expenditure and income. He said that National Accounts are crucial for formulation of policies as well as evaluation of development programmes in all sectors.
He noted that the State Department for Planning works very closely with the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) especially in supporting statistical activities. However, he added that KNBS has sufficient independence in the production of official statistics as provided for by the Statistics Act 2006.
Dr. Muia informed the team that the use of administrative data in compilation of official statistics has gained prominence in the recent past.”The use of these data is cost-effective and reduces respondent fatigue but comes with a few challenges; particularly compatibility in classifications, concepts and scope”, He said.
The PS further said that Kenya uses statistics as parameters in resource sharing and this is provided for in the Constitution of Kenya, 2010.Examples include: the National Government Constituencies Development Fund and the County Revenue Allocation formula.
The PS was accompanied by Economic Planning Secretary Mr. Joseph Mukui, Senior State Departments Economists and Statisticians from Kenya National Bureau of Statistics.
