News

Experts from the State Statistical Office of the Russian Federation (ROSSTAT), working in the field of retail trade statistics were on a three-day mission (30 November – 2 December 2010) to BNSI.

The President of NSI – Assoc. Prof. Mariana Kotzeva will take part in the 7th Meeting of the European Statistical System Committee (ESSC), which will be held on 18 November 2010 in Eurostat, Luxembourg.

According to the agenda, the Committee will take decisions on 7 comitology items – proposals for Commission Regulations as regards labour statistics, healthcare, social protection benefits and accidents at work.

A delegation from the National Statistical Institute, headed by its President Assoc. Prof. Mariana Kotzeva, will visit the National Statistics Office of Malta on 11th and 12th November. Members of the delegation are the Secretary General of NSI Mr. Tsvetan Nanov and experts. The purpose of the visit is to obtain technical and methodological assistance on designing a web-based “School in Statistics”, like the one already developed there.

In October 2010 in NSI a seasonal adjustment of business surveys’ time series was carried out for the first time. The procedure was carried out with the help of the software developed by Eurostat Demetra, where the algorithm TRAMO / SEATS was applied.

On October 22, 2010, the National Statistical Institute held a final workshop on Quality Assurance in the National Statistical System. The workshop was financed by NSI and Eurostat within the frame of the Grant Agreement No 80201.2009.006-2009.318.).

The NSI Deputy President, Gergana Mihaylova opened the forum, welcomed all participants and emphasized the importance the National Statistical System to provide timely and accurate statistical information, respecting all principles of the European Statistics Code of Practice.

On 20 October, World Statistics Day¹ is celebrated for the first time. This event highlights the importance of official statistics in our society. At EU level, efforts have been made over more than 50 years by the National Statistical Offices of the Member States, together with Eurostat, to produce reliable and comparable data. Nowadays European statistics are used in many different ways by a growing number of people.

The NSI President – Assoc. Prof. Mariana Kotzeva will take part in the annual meeting of Eurostat with the EU candidate countries, which will be held on 6 – 7 October 2010 in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

During the sessions the following issues will be discussed:

• preparation of census 2011.

• Eurostat strategy on training statisticians from the Western Balkan countries.

• international cooperation, mainly participation in international meetings.

The NSI gathered in Sofia the Directors General of the National Statistical Institutes of the EU Member States

The 96^th Conference of the Directors General of the National Statistical Institutes of the EU Member States (DGINS) has ended. During the three-day forum, issues about the priorities for the next five-year Community Statistical Programme were discussed and the trends for the European Statistical System up to 2020 were set up.