Our mandate & legislation

The National Statistical Office is established under the Statistical Services Act 1980 (Chapter 386), which commenced on 5 February 1981. The Act gives the National Statistician the authority to collect, compile, analyse and publish official statistics for Papua New Guinea.

What the Act requires of us

• Produce official statistics — conduct the censuses and surveys that no other state agency conducts, including the National Population & Housing Census, the Demographic & Health Survey, the Household Income & Expenditure Survey and business surveys.
• Coordinate the National Statistical System — coordinate statistics produced or administered by other agencies, such as economic and finance statistics, social and demographic statistics and governance statistics.
• Designate official statistics — authorise the use of statistics as official, ensuring they conform to best statistical practice and international standards.

Confidentiality of your information

Part V of the Act protects the data supplied to NSO. Every officer makes a declaration of secrecy (s.30) and information supplied is confidential (s.31). Individual responses to censuses and surveys are used only to produce aggregated statistics and are never released in a form that could identify a person, household or business.

International standards

NSO conforms to the United Nations Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics and follows the Generic Statistical Business Process Model (GSBPM). Our economic statistics follow the System of National Accounts, the International Merchandise Trade Statistics concepts and the Classification of Individual Consumption According to Purpose (COICOP) for the Consumer Price Index.

Modernising the law

The National Statistician has announced a comprehensive review of the Statistical Services Act to deliver a modern statistical law that strengthens data governance, the use of administrative data and the coordination of the National Statistical System.

Key documents

• Statistical Services Act 1980 (PDF)
• Report of the 11th Parliament on the National Statistical Office (PDF)
• NSO Structural Reform Strategy 2021 (PDF)