In Poor Numbers I suggested that many African economies are not growing as fast as the official statistics will have us think, and that we know too little to judge what is happening actually to living standards and poverty in the aggregate. As John...
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Category: Africa’s Statistical Tragedy
What kind of ‘data revolution’ do we need?
There has been talk of a data-revolution. We are not quite sure what it would look like yet. Here are my 'five fundamental propositions' for a data revolution in development. 1. We need to focus on data supply, not only on global data demand....
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The great African data debate
Not my words, but that's what UNU-Wider calls it. As I written before I think that it is true that some countries have better data that are available through household surveys. BUT: not all of these are comparable, and availability is NOT random, hence...
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Inclusive Growth in Africa: Measurement, Causes and Consequences
That was the name of the conference in Helsinki, organized by UNU-WIDER. All in all an underwhelming experience. I understand that we are a bit excited about growth in Africa, but maybe the title of the conference should have been: Inclusive growth in Africa?...
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Africa: Measuring success @ Oxford Analytica Confernence 18-20 September
That's the title of the panel I am invited to speak on at a conference organized by Oxford Analytica, 18-20 September. I am on a panel with Diana Layfield, a Chief Executive Officer of Standard Chartered Africa, Michael Lalor from Ernst and Young (and...
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UNECA chimes in…
Carlos Lopez, cialis the executive secretary of United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, seems to have read the right implications from my research in a blog post which starts: Counting matters! Statistics are the backbone of proper planning for Africa’s future... Read more here.
Pictures from the book launch in Vancouver
“African Economic Development: Measuring Success and Failure”, drug an international conference was held recently at Simon Fraser University, pharmacy Vancouver, hospital Canada. On Friday April 19 I launched the book, you can see more pictures from the launch here. Over fifty leading scholars, data...
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Politics, Damned lies and statistics
In the latest issue of the Africa Report the editor asks: Are the reams of statistics emanating from the United Nations (UN), shop World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) mere works of fiction? Read the editorial here.
Poor Numbers in the ‘Africa Rising’ debate in Foreign Policy
FOREIGN POLICY article - January 28, 2013. "We Have No Idea if Africa Is Rising" Recent FP contributors have said that Africa is and is not rising. They're both wrong because they don't have the numbers to back it up. Read the Article