SSA Canberra + ABS Meeting: Foreman Lecture

Times: 

From 6pm and concluding by 7pm: Presentation on Zoom

Virtual pre-drinks and nibbles are provided, but they don't taste as good as the real thing!

Register in advance for this meeting: 

Speaker: Anders Holmberg, Chief Methodologist, Australian Bureau of Statistics

Topic:  What is the difference and does it matter? Reflections on how the methodology work in official statistics relates among countries and on the Australian opportunities therein.

Abstract:  The topic of the seminar is how statistical laws, societal structures, education systems, history and organisational culture affect how methodological work is done in official statistics. The lecture highlights both understandable and strange differences in why statistical products, despite having the same purpose, are produced in different ways in different countries. Other reflections that are made are about the national statistical offices' approaches to, and their opportunities for collaboration with others in society. This influences which questions are prioritized and how future methodological work programs are designed.

Biography:  Dr. Anders Holmberg is the Chief Methodologist/General Manager of the Methodology Division at the Australian Bureau of Statistics since September 2019. He has a background working with various types of data sources for official statistics in many different countries including Sweden, Cambodia, New Zealand and Norway. He has been a member of Eurostat's Directors of Methodology group and is still a member of the Methodology Advisory boards of Statistics Netherlands and Statistics Sweden. As a practitioner he has worked with the design and collection of sample survey data, the use of multiple administrative data sources in population censuses and administrative data about people, businesses and properties for statistical and research purposes. As one of the statisticians he also worked with the build-up of Statistics Sweden's data laboratory for research and data integration MONA, (Microdata ONline Access).

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