CARICOM Secretariat Develops Online Platform for Sustainable Statistical Capacity-Building

The Regional Statistics Programme of the CARICOM Secretariat has established an electronic platform for training, research and knowledge acquisition that is aimed at improving statistical capacity in the Region on a sustainable basis.

The platform is the Statistical Training and Research in the Caribbean (e-CISTAR) financed under the 11^th European Development Fund Strengthening the Framework of CARICOM Integration and Cooperation Process (SFCICP) Programme..

One of the deliverables of the Regional Strategy for the Development of Statistics, the platform is aimed at supporting the development of the e-learning platform to train members of staff of the National Statistical Offices and other stakeholders across the Region.

Visitors to the site will find training materials derived from a pilot activity that was supported by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), as well as links to other training resources. There is a tab for the Statistics Centres of Excellence, that is being developed among statistical agencies in CARICOM. Manuals, guidelines and other reference documents are included in the Knowledge Base component of the e-CISTAR, as are frequently asked questions. The Knowledge Base is secure with strong encryption standards for sensitive data and also has the facility for the creation of groups of users, collaboration on live documents, as well as powerful live and custom-filtered searches.

While there will be continuous updates, and design and development work being undertaken on the Moodle-driven platform, it is currently semi-operational. Once the site is fully operational, some of the key functions would be: 

·         access to training of staff of the CARICOM Statistical System (CSS) of CARICOM including the National Statistical Systems (NSS) in Member States/Associate Members and other CARICOM agencies with statistical units;

·         availability of statistical resources and the sharing of knowledge to support the production and dissemination of statistics in the CSS;

·         networking on statistical issues and concerns, the sharing of best practices across the CSS and the facilitation of exchange visits and attachments linked to Centres of Excellence in NSOs/NSS;

·         access to and support for the conduct of applied research and analysis as a support service required to be conducted by countries to enable the adoption of regional and international work programmes, recommendations and related statistical analysis and research (also to enable training in data analysis).

 To gain full access to this platform, you first need to create an account, see steps below: 

1.       Click on the link or enter the url: https://ecistar.org/  

2.       Point to the menu tab Training and select Caricom Online training  (The direct URL to the Moodle platform/ Caricom Online Training is https://ecistar.org/learning) 

3.       Once you arrive at the Moodle page, select log in. From there you will see the message, Is this your first time here?  

4.       Select the Create new account tab and Register. 

Note to Editors:

The Regional Strategy for the Development of Statistics is aimed at strengthening and improving the availability of quality statistics for evidence-based decision-making across the Region. It is considered to be the Region’s gateway to building resilience and achieving sustainable development that is anchored on sound data. CARICOM Heads of Government have endorsed the Strategy which the Standing Committee of Caribbean Statisticians (SCCS) produced with funding support of the Partnership in Statistics for Development in the 21st Century (PARIS21).