To present and discuss the projects and the work plan of Kurdistan Region Statistics Office (KRSO) for 2023
5 December 2022

, two-day workshop was held in Sulaymaniyah governorate (30/11/2022-1/12/2022).

In the presence of the president of KRSO and participation of the statistics directors of the governorates and administrations of the Kurdistan Region and the heads of technical departments of KRSO, the work plan and proposed projects of KRSO for 2023 were presented. The projects were discussed one by one, and the participants expressed their comments and recommendations on how to better carry out these projects to promote statistics in Kurdistan Region. They also emphasized on more coordination between the KRG ministries, international organizations and KRSO.

The proposed projects of KRSO for 2023 are diversified a way as to provide the most statistical indicators to be used by planning units and policy makers to reflect the reality of Kurdistan in all areas of livelihood.

The proposed statistical projects of KRSO covers the fields of economy, social, health, education, trade, transportation, construction, industry, population, and labor force. The workshop also focused on the relationship between KRSO and the Central Statistical Organization (CSO) mentioning the strong and weak points of this relationship and how to organize them in such a way to be of interest of the work plan of KRSO.

In the years following 2014, due to the financial crisis because of cutting the budget share of Kurdistan region by the federal government, the imposed war by the terrorist organization (ISIS) and the outbreak of COVI-19, prevented the government of Kurdistan Region from providing the annual budget for KRSO and many of the ministries, KRSO relied on financial support from international organizations to implement statistical projects.

However, currently, international organizations decided to allocate financial resources by donor countries on development projects instead of emergency as most donor countries connected KRG’s financial status with the federal government. For this reason, it was necessary for KRSO try to submit an annual plan aligned with the current situation and present a new statistical plan to the Ministry of Planning for approval and allocation of budget for statistical projects so that Kurdistan Region Government has its own new data and indicators, which can provide an overview to all ministries and the international community to have and implement their plans within the outline strategy of the ninth cabinet