'National accounts figures accurate'

By Gamini Warushamana

The Director General of the Department of Census and Statistics, D.C.A. Gunawardena assured the accuracy and credibility of all the statistics published by the Department including national accounts and inflation figures.

Responding to the recent charges raised against manipulation of figures of national accounts during the Budget debate in Parliament, Gunawardena said that all the charges were baseless.

In the compilation of National Accounts we follow the guidelines of the Systems of National Account of the UN and the process is transparent.

There are other institutions such as IMF, World Bank and Asian Development Bank that keenly look at the development in the economy and monitor the economic growth rate quarterly.

Independent institutions such as Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) publish their own reports and in the history of the department our national accounts figures have never been challenged locally or internationally, he said.

“To improve the compilation of national accounts the department has launched several new initiatives.

Transparency in the process has been improved and we have obtained consultancy from Indian experts.

We have recruited qualified people to the National Accounts division and extensive training has been given to the staff,” Gunawardena said.

“This allegation about the credibility of National Accounts statistics was raised by one of our staff and since there is a court case on the matter I do not wish to comment on it.

"A statement given at a preliminary investigation has been referred at the Parliament and in media reports and is biased and contains falsehoods,” he said.

“However, I assure you that our statistics are accurate. Our department has published minus economic growth and high inflation,” Gunawardena said.