In summer 2007, Statistics Norway was evaluated in what is known as a peer review, by representatives from other European statistics agencies. The purpose of the evaluation was to establish whether Statistics Norway complies with the European guidelines on the production of statistics. The evaluation group focussed on seven points in the guidelines, including professional independence, quality work and dissemination. The group concluded that Statistics Norway meets all the requirements either fully or to a large extent. Statistics Norway was given the highest grade (‘fully met’) for 35 of the measured points, and ‘largely met’, which is second best, for eight of the points. The whole report is available here.
The background for the evaluation was that the member countries of the EU and EFTA have undertaken to adhere to specific guidelines on the production of official statistics, European Statistics Code of Practice. These 15 principles set specific requirements for conditions in institutions for the production of statistics and for the quality of the statistical processes and end products.
Such peer review evaluations have also been carried out in the other EU member countries. All of the reports are available from Eurostat. A summary of positive findings from the evaluations, known as 'Good practices', is also available. One of the points that Eurostat highlighted is that Statistics Norway has a high degree of credibility among the Norwegian population.
As part of the preparations for the peer review evaluation carried out in Statistics Norway in March 2007, a survey was conducted in order to gather information on how we are perceived by our users. The sample consisted of all those subscribed to news via e-mail. These users are not representative of all Statistics Norway’s users, but probably represent our professional users well. The whole report is available here, or may be ordered from our Sales and subscription service.
Published 26 October 2009 © Statistics Norway