Fahad Aldossari

As it approaches its 65th year in 2025, GASTAT has achieved milestones including the Saudi Census 2022 results and more refined and comprehensive statistical products.

GASTAT is the only official reference for statistical work in Saudi Arabia. Can you outline its operations?

In 2025, GASTAT will celebrate its 65th year. Statistical work in the Kingdom started in an early stage and witnessed a remarkable development throughout its long history. One of the key roles of GASTAT is to provide public and private entities with official statistics, consultancy related to statistics, and technical services. These services aid policy and decision-makers in these entities to execute the Kingdom’s developmental plans. Statistical census such as the population, households, and housing are one of GASTAT’s key products. Beyond the results of field surveys, GASTAT publishes periodic statistical data and insights spanning sectors like economic, social, health, education, agriculture, as well as labor force metrics. Additionally, GASTAT is entrusted with the task of refining and modernizing national statistics in accordance with international standards and best practices. GASTAT disseminates its services and statistical products through an extensive digital database encompassing various development sectors in Saudi Arabia.

Can you shed some light on the latest milestones achieved under your mandate?

We have implemented several initiatives to enhance the accuracy and presentation of our statistics, as well as to broaden their scope and transparency. A recent significant achievement was the unveiling of the Saudi Census 2022 results in May 2023, which provided comprehensive data across three pivotal categories: population, households, and housing. Results on education, health, employment, income, migration, and diversity are set to be unveiled in 4Q2023. Another pivotal achievement is the expansion of the activities and products used to measure the performance of the Saudi economy in the supply and use tables. In 2022, GASTAT embarked on a significant expansion of its GDP supply and use tables, enhancing the scope from 18 activities and products to 85 activities and 84 products. The commitment to provide a comprehensive statistical landscape does not stop there; future expansions are already on the horizon. GASTAT is working to provide a more granular data to policymakers through diving deep into sector-specific satellite accounts, focusing currently on sectors like tourism, entertainment, and sports, among others. Moreover, in our pursuit of precision, 2024 will witness GASTAT adopting the chain-linking methodology to measure GDP. This advanced approach promises to depict our economy’s performance more accurately, offering a clearer and more precise representation of its structure. Finally, to further ensure up-to-date economic insights, GASTAT is also setting its sights on updating its base year through a comprehensive economic survey planned for the coming year.

How are you working to establish strategic partnerships to improve the quality of your research and better serve the community?

Strengthening and cultivating partnerships with both the public and private sectors, as well as international organizations, ranks high among GASTAT’s strategic initiatives. Such partnerships are instrumental in gathering and analyzing the data from diverse sources and in deriving essential indicators. The results of the statistical work not only guide policymakers and decision-makers in the Kingdom but also shape the advancement of public services. GASTAT is also working on setting up an innovation center. The primary aim is to synergize the capabilities of researchers and academics with GASTAT team, fostering the development of groundbreaking ideas that can benefit global community. GASTAT also actively collaborates with counterparts from other nations, as well as regional and international organizations, to facilitate the exchange of expertise, knowledge, and best practices within the statistical domain.

What is the short-term focus of your activity?

Our immediate focus is on enhancing a select list of products. Our intent is to channel resources into initiatives that bolster the coverage, quality, and responsiveness of our statistical offerings. Key projects on our radar for this year and next year include enhancing the granularity of our national accounts statistics, rolling out the second wave of the Saudi Census 2022, and producing and publishing the results of the newly conducted household income and expenditure survey. These undertakings encapsulate GASTAT’s primary emphasis in the near term.