The Praia Group on Governance Statistics (the Praia Group) is the first African city group, created in March 2015 at the forty-sixth session of the United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC). The establishment of the Group in 2015 came out of international recognition that governance statistics are a critical area of statistics that lack the maturity as other statistics and are underinvested in most parts of the world.
The Praia Group has as its mandate to “contribute to establishing international standards and methods for the compilation of statistics on the major dimensions of governance”. To this end, the Group has been charged to develop “a handbook on governance statistics for national statistical offices, which will cover the conceptualization, measurement methodology and dissemination of governance statistics”.
Demand for governance statistics is increasing, particularly in the context of the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) and SDG 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions). Even though National Statistical Offices are careful about measuring governance because of its political implications, it is important to note that statistics offices are well placed to measure governance.
Statistics on the quality and performance of institutions in the delivery of public services and goods including justice, human rights and security are critical not only for understanding progress on some of the targets on SDG 16 but for understanding progress on all the goals.
The Praia Group has been tasked to encourage countries to produce governance statistics based on sound and documented methodologies and to address the conceptualization, methodology and instruments needed to produce such statistics.
The secretariat is located in Praia and hosted by Cabo Verde’s National Statistics Institute. Cabo Verde hosted the secretariat given its leadership in the pioneering pan-African initiative to harmonize statistics on governance, peace , security (SHaSA-GPS) and to regularly measure and monitor the performance of our governance institutions through the experiences and perceptions of our people.
Our Objectives
- To provide a forum for national and international statistical organizations, international agencies, academia, research groups and civil society organizations to share and develop expertise in governance statistics.
- To review, propose and promote the definition and harmonization of governance indicators, through the development of manuals and methodological guidelines.
- To document sound practices and provide inputs for the development of an indicator framework for the measurement and monitoring of the goal and targets related to peace and governance in the post-2015 development agenda and in other global initiatives.
- To assess the demand for governance statistics among potential user constituencies and highlight best-practices in their use.
- To provide advice on ways to enhance processes and standards for the public dissemination of governance statistics.