Demographic and Social Statistics

The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) carried out a capacity development mission to the Maldives to accelerate progress towards the production of core international migration statistics in the country as part of ongoing support under the DA 13 project 'Administrative data for disaggregated Sustainable Development Goals indicators in Africa, Asia and the Pacific and Latin America'. The mission consisted of a three-day workshop, 10-12 December 2024, co-organized with the Maldives Bureau of Statistics (MBS) and hosted by Maldives Immigration. The objectives of the workshop were to: familiarize MBS and relevant administrative data producers in the national statistical system (NSS) with the revised conceptual framework on international migration and temporary mobility statistics, discuss steps necessary for integrating administrative data sources across the NSS for the production of migration statistics, and examine available data and metadata across data producers, highlighting discrepancies and methods to harmonize variables. Following the workshop, a high-level meeting on 16 December with the leadership of MBS and Maldives Immigration endorsed the way forward, including the finalization of an MoU governing data sharing. The training underscored the importance of inter-agency cooperation to enhance the quality, timeliness and accuracy of migration data for improved policymaking.