"ESCWA organized a regional workshop on implementation of the 4th edition of the international standard industrial classification for all economic activities (ISIC rev. 4) for the Arab countries jointly with the Arab Institute for Training and Statistical Research (AITRS), the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) in New York in the Amman, Jordan during 28 September – 1 October 2014. The workshop aimed at contributing to the development of economic statistics in the Arab region and building national capacities in the Arab countries through a tailored training on the newly produced implementation guide of ISIC rev. 4. A number of topics were covered during the training workshop including the technical aspects of the ISIC implementation process. In particular, participants were trained on: managing the implementation process, developing a national version of ISIC, developing correspondence tables with earlier versions, backcasting of previous data upon a classification change, and application of a revised classification in statistical programs especially with regards to sampling and weight issues. A further topic business registers was presented and participants were trained on registers recoding upon a classification change, the tools, maintenance and quality assurance so that registers can be used as a main source of data instead of costly field surveys.
The workshop was an ample opportunity for the participants to also learn about the experiences from ESCWA member countries in implementing the latest version of ISIC. Presentations on national experiences shed light on the status quo, the prevailing gaps and difficulties facing the implementation processes in these countries in addition to the various needs for future development. National presentations and the discussions that followed helped participants share the lessons learned especially in relation to the experience of those countries that made closer to full implementation of ISIC ver. 4. Many participants had also the room to validate their acquired knowledge in the area of implementing ISIC classification with has been presented from the implementation guide and acquired new knowledge as well.
The workshop was attended by 25 participants from government entities in 13 Arab countries from national statistics offices, ministries of trade and industry in addition to participation from Jordan Chamber of Industry. The participants gained the knowledge and skills that were hoped for as was evident through the evaluation forms completed by them. Further, the evaluation also showed increasing interest on the part of participants with similar events on the national level in the future in addition to those on the regional level. The workshop came up with a number of recommendations that stressed the need to facilitate implementation of ISIC due to the need and importance of ISIC for the various economic statistics especially national accounts, the need to introduce coordination mechanism between concerned entities at the national level for classifications implementation, the adoption of a unique national classification to be used by all entities and to introduce the needed and supportive legislations. The workshop was facilitated and organized by the Economic Statistics Section at ESCWA Statistics Division besides ESCWA’s regional advisor for national accounts."
Cairo, Egypt
