1. Background and Purpose

Statistics is very important as fundamental information to decision-making among members of a nation as well as perform efficient national operations. Nevertheless, Korea has been undergoing many difficulties in understanding social issues, establishing policies, reasonable decision makings of companies, and research functioning in academia due to the lack of statistical information.

The significance of statistics looks to be increasing in coming years and the role of the government is very important at this point because statistics has nature of public goods. Efficiency in national statistical system means to build a systemized process to maximize the use of the properties of information goods and compile high quality statistics efficiently. The national statistics in Korea is far less developed than ones of advanced countries and this stems from the weakness in national statistical system. Under such recognition this report is written to examine the Korean national statistics and the compiling system to suggest the future development plans.

2. Major content

Many national administrative agencies of Korea are producing various statistics under dispersed statistical system. The quality of Korean statistics, which lacks the necessary conditions to compile good statistics, is very low compared to conventional evaluation standards.

The problems of Korean national statistics can be summed up in the ways that, first of all, not enough types of statistical analyses are introduced to cope with the nation needs for various statistics, secondly, it is highly probable that the current statistics have a lot of problems in the quality, thirdly, statistics are not fully utilized by people because national interests for statistics are very low.

Although such problems are rather impossible to be proved clearly by objective evidences because of the nature of statistics, the comparisons of similar statistics and examination of statistical procedures showed that Korean national statistics have such problems with high probability.

The reason for these weaknesses in Korean national statistics is rooted in the fact that national statistics has structural vulnerability and is not functioning properly. We need to reinforce the national statistics system in order to improve national statistics. Considering the vulnerability in the national statistics, reforms on the extension of the current system only bring limited improvement. Hence, a profound level of reformation that re-inspects national statistical system from the starting point must be done.

First, we need to examine the statistical system. In order to do this, the direction that Korean statistical system will move on to in the future must be set and we need to adapt most efficient system that will fit the current situation of Korea. With the consideration on the field of statistical infrastructure, the field that is especially venerable, adaptation of centralized statistical system is recommended. Also, the statistical controlling function will be extremely important in the sense that it will promote the relevancy, appropriateness, integration among statistics. By reinforcing the cooperation from government departments, we need to maximize the utilization of various types of national information for statistical analyses and take full advantages on usages of the statistical results.

Expansion and rearrangement of workforce in the field of statistics are also necessary. This means both the quantity, increase in the number of the workforce, and the quality, restructuring the workforce, should be done. Expansion of the work force in number is the precondition of improvement in national statistical system and it seems all other development plans are meaningless without it. There are two ways to perform the expansion, first, increasing the absolute number of work force, second, improving the structure of the workforce via actively rearranging the workforce by functionalities, reconsidering the efficiency, and outsourcing.

It is crucial to expand the functions of local statistics. The functions of local statistics are stressed in the aspects of the efficiency of researches and reinforcement in functionality to create the local statistics. And we are facing the practical problems to concretely deal with the differences of the local statistical offices and current functions of self-governing statistical system. For the reinforcement of statistical systems it is very important to have an efficient management system for each step in using and manufacturing processes such as creating, management, utilizing, etc. For this problem we need an improvement of statistical system that will expand the usage of the statistics along with quality control system. Especially, statistical understanding and recognition of government officers and citizens should be raised to improve the quality of statistics and upgrade statistical usage.

For the purpose of benchmarking to improve Korean statistical system, analyses of national statistical systems in advanced countries were performed. As a result, although they are running on various statistical systems in accordance with their national environments, administrative tradition, characteristics of government systems, they are all same in showing the implications that they consider the function of national statistics as one of important government functions, have a credible national statistical institutions and enough workforce regardless of the statistical systems, use the information of the government as basic statistical data actively, systemized the functionality to control national statistics via human resource and budget systems, and prefer centered statistical system so that they can focus on the improvement of statistical administration.

3. Result and implications

From the examining the Korean national statistical and creation system we could see that the unreliability of the national statistics is extremely high and the unreliability is rooted in the weaknesses of national statistical system. We suggest the development plans by bringing out concrete problems of national statistical system and benchmarking the statistical systems of advanced countries as following.

① Establishment of strategy for national statistical development

② Increasing the numbers of statistical workforce and organization

③ Reinforcing the elements in centered statistical system

④ Controlling the priority of national statistics

⑤ Reinforcing the local statistical functions

⑥ Reinforcing the statistical control functions

⑦ Expanding the information sharing among departments

⑧ Reinforcing the research and analyses functions

⑨ Increasing the communications between statistics suppliers and demanders

발간사

요 약

제１장 서 론

　제1절 연구목적
　제2절 보고서의 구성과 흐름
　　1. 보고서의 구성
　　2. 보고서의 전체적 흐름

제２장 국가통계와 통계제도

　제1절 국가통계의 의의
　　1. 통계의 정의와 종류
　　2. 통계 및 통계행정의 특징
　제2절 국가기능과 통계환경의 변화
　　1. 국가기능의 변화
　　2. 통계생산자로서 국가의 기능
　제3절 통계제도
　　1. 통계제도의 형태와 특징
　　2. 주요 국가의 통계제도
　제4절 통계환경과 과제
　　1. 통계생산환경의 변화
　　2. 우리나라 국가통계의 과제

제３장 국가통계 및 통계시스템의 실태

　제1절 국가통계 및 통계시스템의 개관
　　1. 국가통계 현황
　　2. 통계조직 및 인력 현황
　　3. 주요 정부 통계작성기관의 실태
　제2절 우리나라 국가통계의 실상
　　1. 국가통계의 평가기준
　　2. 관련성: 통계수요에 대응한 통계공급
　　3. 통계의 정확성과 신뢰성
　　4. 주요 통계에 대한 이용자의 평가
　　5. 통계작성 절차적 접근

제４장 우리나라 통계시스템의 문제점과 개선과제

　제1절 통계 및 통계행정에 대한 인식 부족
　제2절 통계조직·인력의 확충
　　1. 통계제도의 개편 검토
　　2. 통계조직의 확충: 기구·인력 확대와 기능 재편
　　3. 통계자원의 조정 필요성
　　4. 통계조사원제도의 개선
　제3절 통계조정 및 통계자원의 공유
　　1. 통계조정기능의 강화
　　2. 정부기관 간 자료 공유의 확대
　제4절 통계조사의 충실화
　　1. 통계조사단계의 현실과 문제점
　　2. 조사체계 및 방법론의 개선
　제5절 지역통계기능 발전
　　1. 지역통계 및 통계조직 현황
　　2. 지역통계기능 강화방안
　제6절 연구·개발·분석 기능의 강화
　　1. 연구·개발·분석 기능의 필요성
　　2. 선진국 통계기관의 연구기능
　　3. 발전방안
　제7절 통계보급의 확대 및 통계활용 강화
　　1. 통계보급체계의 개선
　　2. 통계에 대한 이해 제고

제５장 외국의 통계시스템

　제1절 미 국
　　1. 통계제도의 개황
　　2. 상무부 센서스국
　　3. 센서스국 지방사무소
　　4. 통계조정
　　5. 「미국정부의 통계프로그램」
　　6. 연방통계기구의 설립 검토
　제2절 일 본
　　1. 통계제도의 개황
　　2. 통계법규
　　3. 중앙통계기관
　　4. 지방통계기구
　　5. 「통계행정의 새로운 전개방향」
　제3절 캐나다
　　1. 통계제도 개황
　　2. 캐나다 통계청의 업무와 평가
　　3. 개인정보 보호 및 조사부담 경감
　제4절 영 국
　　1. 제도개황
　　2. 에이전시(Agency) 제도와 성과관리
　　3. 영국통계제도의 발전계획
　제5절 프랑스
　제6절 선진국 통계제도의 비교분석
　　1. 통계제도
　　2. 통계조정기능
　　3. 자료수집
　　4. 자문기구
　제7절 선진국 통계제도의 특징과 시사점

제６장 국가통계시스템 발전방안

　제1절 기본인식
　제2절 발전방안

참고문헌