Page 352 - Contributed Paper Session (CPS) - Volume 4

CPS2259 Florabela Carausu et al.
4. Discussion and Conclusion
The focus on the geographical breakdown has raised expectations from
the users of statistics. Nevertheless, not always the hyper-local or hyper-
detailed approach is possible or relevant. Understanding the trade-off
between accuracy and relevance is important. The close and regular dialogue
between (official) statistics producers and users is needed in order to bring in
line the demand and the supply for local and regional statistics.
The territorial interdependencies and interaction imply that almost any
development issue has to extend beyond the administrative borders. The
examples are diverse, from social inclusion to industrial and economic
synergies, to environmental challenges or infrastructure provision, etc. This
improved orientation to policy making establishes a real challenge from the
statistical point of view. On one side, data should be available for the definition
or delineation of functional areas, and furthermore, the methods for the
delineation of functional areas, as the Labour Market Areas case study showed,
are sensitive to the quality of the input data.
On the other side, once defined the functional areas, data and indicators
at their level should be produced with certain regularity in order toallow for
the monitoring and evaluation of the targeted measures. The necessity of
continuation makes the difference between actionoriented analysis and
decision oriented analysis.
In the European context, there is a wide consensus that functional areas
are the preferred level for policy making, though there is not any ideal
functional area, they all depend on the purpose of the analysis concerned.
Functional areas can be seen as an approach and opportunity to target the
Leave no one behind objective. At European level there are several initiatives
that may serve as an example.

References
1. Partnership in Statistics for Development in the 21st century, Partner
Report on Support to Statistics
2. UN Data Revolution for Sustainable Development Independent Expert
Advisory Group: “A World that Counts”
3. Coombes M., Casado J.M, Martinez L, Wymer C.: ‘Labour Market Areas
(LMAs): the challenge of meeting policy and statistical requirements’,
SCORUS 2018 Warsaw, Poland
4. T. German; J. Randel (2017): ‘Delivering results to Leave no one behind’ –
discussion paper for the Results Community OECD workshop ‘What
Results – Who Counts?’
5. Fabrizio Barca (2019): ‘An Agenda for a Reformed Cohesion Policy – A
place-based approach to meeting European Union challenges and
expectations’

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