The Australian Deputy High Commissioner, Ms. Claire McGeechan presented equipment on 8 August 2023 to the Samoa Bureau of Statistics (SBS) as part of the significant financial support of $WST1.2 million from the Tautai – Governance for Economic Growth Partnership program provided under the assistance of the Australian Government to support the Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES).

The Government Statistician accepted the assistance on behalf of the Government and People of Samoa and thanked the Government of Australia through the Australian High Commission, for their commitment in assisting the SBS in ensuring that the survey is equipped with the right office equipment to further improve the collection and dissemination of statistics. It will also serve as a continuous reminder of the close relationship between the two countries.

He further stated that the presentation of the equipment is a solid evidence and testimony of the Australia Government’s continuous commitment to support the SBS in its responsibilities to meet the vision “An efficient statistical system that provides trusted and valued statistics to inform policy and decision making for the benefit of Samoa” as specified under the Samoa Statistics Strategy for 2022 – 2026.

The equipment package includes laptops, tablets, and statistical software which will help facilitate certain validations and checks during the survey enumeration, monitoring of responses from the selected households to ensure that the data / information collected from the survey is trusted and of high quality to serve the different purposes as highlighted in the objectives of the HIES.