It was successfully established and the main objectives of SAARCSTAT are to plan and undertake policy initiatives for comparable and timely statistics, harmonize classifications, concepts and definitions, adopt international good practices, promote improvement in official statistics, and promote human resource development. Last year the conference was held in Katmandu, Nepal and there Sri Lanka was nominated to host the conference for 2015.

Accordingly, this time SAARCSTAT conference will be held for the seventh time and it is organized by the National Statistical Organization (NSO) of Sri Lanka; Department of Census and Statistics (DCS) with the coordination of Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The conference is scheduled to be held on 23 and 24 July at Taj Samudra Hotel, Colombo and Director General of DCS, Dr. Amara Satharasingha will be officially elected as the Chairperson of the seventh conference.

The inauguration of the conference will be held on 23 July at 9.00 am and Chief Guest of the event is Prof. Kithsiri Liyanage, Secretary of the Ministry of Planning and Economic affairs. Heads and delegates from SAARC countries; India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives and host country Sri Lanka and Delegates from SAARC Secretariat established in Katmandu, Nepal will attend the inauguration. Delegates from the SAARC Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and key local and foreign data users will also attend the event.

In order to focus on high disparity of child education in the region, the theme of the conference has been titled as “Educational Statistics”.