The State Statistics Service of Ukraine (SSS) is currently working on developing a new, more user-friendly website, which it plans to launch in autumn this year, according to SSS head Arsen Makarchuk.
“It is not only the product that is important, but also its packaging, presentation… We need to become closer and better in presenting our product. It (the website) should become a place where statistics answer questions, allow you to see the country through data, and not just be uploaded in Excel format,” he said in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
Makarchuk noted that, in accordance with legislation and established practice, the term “user” is used in official documents at the State Statistics Service, but for him it is essential to consider those for whom the statistical agency works not as users, but as customers.
“What is a client? Essentially, it is an economic agent who makes an informed choice in favor of using your products or refusing to use them if the product is not satisfactory. To satisfy our client, we need to provide them with what they need,” emphasized Makarchuk, who headed the State Statistics Service in early March, having previously worked at the National Bank for many years.
According to him, if the State Statistics Service cannot satisfy the customer’s need for data, the customer will satisfy it elsewhere, even if the data quality is worse, while the state statistics agency will be left “out in the cold.”
As an example, the new head cited the consumer price index assessment, which he would like to speed up because some clients may use web scraping, an automated process of collecting large amounts of data on the Internet, instead of official statistics.
Another example Makarchuk cited was the population estimate, which the State Statistics Service has not published since 2022 for objective reasons, and therefore many clients — from central executive authorities to international organizations — rely on their own estimates, such as the Institute of Demography, which estimates the population at 28 to 34 million.
“The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund conduct their own estimates. We do not know what methodologies they use. These are largely assumptions rather than accurate estimates, but in the absence of our product, they use others. The threat is that at some point we will have no customers left. If we don’t offer a good product that meets their requirements, they will find other sources,” Makarchuk concluded.
