Collaborative Project with the Centeral Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS)

Objective/Contributions:

Statistics play a crucial role in the overall development policy-making process of countries by providing evidence for setting objectives, targets and priorities. The issue of great concern, however, has been how to collect data easily, cost-effectively and in a manner that allows easy data management, cleaning and analysis. Currently, manual paper-based data collection methods have been mostly used to collect survey data. Such paper-based methods involve printing the paper questionnaire, transporting them to and from the field and getting them to a central location for data entry. The process requires a lot of human resources and a lengthy time. The Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics, (CAPMAS) in collaboration with Nile University (NU), as a National Research and Training Institute (NRTI), with financial and technical support from the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) is implementing a pilot project in the use of mobile technology to collect Consumer Price Index (CPI) data. The project aims to strengthen the capacity of the country to collect data with mobile technology, experiment with self–enumeration using mobile devices to collect data and determine the suitability of such data for the production of statistics, and finally strengthen the working relationship between the NSO and TRI in statistical development.

Outcome: 

Developed an Android tablet application that aims to replace the paper-based system currently used by the Egyptian Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) to collect the prices of commercial goods and services. Consult and direct the infrastructure upgrades at CAPMAS including computer servers and software comments. Train CAPMAS developers to maintain the tablet application and implement any needed modifications in the future.