Mese: Dicembre 2016

An innovative webGIS system for the dissemination and the visualization of official statistics and geospatial analysis
Scarica il paper su Statview
 

Introduction
Statistical information is essential for decision makers, politicians, researchers, journalists and the general public. They need relevant, reliable and even more timely data for their work. National Statistical Offices (NSOs) play a key role in developing, producing and disseminating official data in compliance with the United Nations Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics and the European Statistics Code of Practice.
As recognized by the ESS Vision 2020, in order to improve the quality of official statistics, it is important to complement existing data derived from traditional surveys or administrative sources, with newer sources, including geospatial and where possible big data, as well as emphasize the relevance and the opportunity of sharing tools within the ESS and the usefulness of proper dissemination channels that meet the needs of
as many people as possible.  Solicited by ESS, NSOs have started exploring new technology-driven areas when dealing with very large amount of data and developing suitable tools for the integration of different types of information and its dissemination, i.e. platforms for data storage, analysis and visualization.

Methods / Problem statement
At present, one challenge for statistical offices is the digital transformation going on world-wide. The ever increasing availability of data, facilitated by advances in information technology and the Internet, requires the implementation of methods and tools for the proper assessment, interpretation and dissemination of the same data. A particularly interesting way to integrate different sets of data is to place them in a geospatial dimension; in this way, the complexity of phenomena of interest is still there but their analysis can be facilitated, thus
enabling a more accurate and timely decision-making and an early warning is made more at hand.
In order to produce simple density maps or dashboard containing tables and graphs, many commercial and open source tools have been developed. However, these tools do not often take advantage of the potential of geo-referenced data, simply providing users with little more than infographics.

Results / Proposed solution
StatVIEW (www.statview.eu) is an innovative tool which can conveniently support whatever analysis focused on one or more subject areas covered by official statistics (social, demographic, economic, environmental, etc.). It is a user-friendly webGIS system, developed by making use of open source technologies, which allows users to gather, link, standardize and visualize statistical data in different
formats, including plotter/density maps, heatmaps, dynamic graphs and bubble charts. Like those on population, health, education, labour, environment, national accounts and social security and welfare produced and provided by the Italian National Institute of Statistics currently visualized through StatVIEW, data produced by NSOs, research institutes and government agencies, available according to different
geographical units, can be disseminated through the web using web-services complying with the json-STAT standard or other data exchange standards (i.e., SDMX, OData); also data other than official statistics can easily enter the webGIS system.
The release of geospatial data in the form of Web Map Service (WMS) and Web Features Service (WFS) is managed by Geoserver, which provides data on territorial boundaries and points of interest as open multisource data. StatVIEW may be seen as a json-STAT hub that can be used as a web-service to further disseminate the data in a machine-readable format.

Conclusions
StatVIEW is a suitable and easy tool that helps to best analyze the many phenomena for which statistical data exist as well as to quickly monitor the evolution of different phenomena at the same time. One its significant feature is represented by the opportunity of having constantly updated statistical information, given the fact that the webGIS system does not imply the loading and tranferring of data, while, instead, it
provides a dynamic link. Overall, this open source tool can be conveniently shared among NSOs, while it is extensible to any institution that performs data dissemination through API REST. Furthermore, a webGIS system such as StatVIEW is along the lines of ESS Vision 2020, in the sense that it helps official statistics to engage users proactively and to meet their demands in a cost-effective and responsive manner

A tool for the automatic collection of administrative data to produce official statistics  Scarica il paper

Introduction
The need for relevant, reliable and even more timely statistical data to support decision making process and scientific research has contributed to a growing demand for new statistical information to best analyze and rule, at various levels, the deep social, economic and environmental changes occurred at regional and global scale. Off
icial statistics, characterized by the highest quality possible inasmuch as they are produced in compliance with the United Nations Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics and the European Statistics Code of Practice, are best suited to meet this need.
It is widely recognized the increasing role that administrative data are playing in the production of more timely, more disaggregated statistics at higher frequencies than traditional survey data. They offer further information on a wide range of issues, including some which cannot be answered cost-effectively from survey data. The efficient use of all available information to produce timely, accurate and high quality statistics is a challenge for National Statistical Offices (NSOs), which are even more committed to developing methods and suitable tools for the production, collection, standardization and integration of different types of statistical data. Bringing together information from different sources makes it possible to fill information gaps or provide insights which cannot be gleaned from the unlinked data and to improve the knowledge and the understanding about specific phenomena

Methods / Problem statement
The production of statistics based on administrative data from different sources is closely related to the methods and techniques of collection and integration of archives. Problems related to automatic data collection are numerous as they involve the production, the harmonization and the standardization of output
and information flows, in order to make them usable by web applications or be stored in one database to be connected (record linkage), processed by statistical software and/or visualized within ad hoc created web platforms.

Results / Proposed solution
DataSTAT Hub is a tool that takes advantage of the potential offered by HTTP 2.0 through which it is possible to create REST microservices and exploit the methods offered by the CRUD architecture (Create,Read, Update, Delete). DataSTAT HUB can be used through two different architectures: star or centralized.
The former implies that each microservice (hub node) is automatically populated by data providing subject through a set of querystrings (Create, Update, Delete) and can be accessed in reading (GET) by the central institution that performs data collection. The latter architecture implies the automatic population of the central hub that interfaces with the various institutions through the just mentioned querystrings (Create, Update, Delete) that allow users to store data and metadata in a NoSQL database (Cassandra) using the key-value data model for their representation. DataSTAT Hub allows users to standardize the outputs in various formats (XML, JSON, CSV) and models
(JSON-STAT, SDMX, DDI).

Conclusions
DataSTAT Hub is a suitable and easy tool for administrative data collection, standardization and integration: it does not require knowledge of the internal data base since the update is performed through the HTTP querystrings and can be used with any programming language. By allowing us to overcome some critical issues related to the use of administrative data, including those connected with privacy and security, a tool such as DataSTAT Hub is time saving and cost- effective, while providing high quality information. It is a user-friendly tool developed by making use of open source technologies (PHP, MySQL, Cassandra) and can be conveniently shared among NSOs, while it is extensible to any institution interested in the automatic collection and integration of administrative data.