The Voorburg Group has been created in 1987 in response to a request from the United Nations Statistical Office (UNSO), for assistance in developing services statistics. It was set up at the initiative of Statistics Canada. The first meeting, hosted by the Netherlands Statistical Office (CBS) was held in January of 1987 in Voorburg (Netherlands), from which it derives its name.
The main purpose of the Group is to be an informal forum for the exchange of views on service statistics. Grouping together national and international statistical agencies, it aims to address issues related to the production of services statistics including service product outputs and inputs, the estimation of the real product of service activities, price index of services products and industries, and their implications for product and industry classification (CPC and ISIC).
The Group meets annually. At its meeting held in Rome in 1998, the Voorburg Group agreed on topics to be the core activity of the Group for the period 1999-2001, in particular the measurement of demand for services by enterprises, a classification of information and communication technology (ICT) products and a model survey for the collection of information on ICT usage and demand, based on the Scandinavian experience in collecting such information. A model questionnaire on ICT usage by enterprises will be produced and presented to OECD's WP II on Information Society Indicators.(2000). The next meeting will be held on September 18-22, 2000 in Madrid, Spain.
It is led by a Bureau which consists of a core group of members elected each year, the chairperson of the last meeting and the chairperson of the next meeting.
A complete list and all the papers presented to and discussed at the Voorburg Group meetings since its inception are available on the Voorburg Group web-site.
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Contact Peter Bøegh Nielsen,
Services Division Statistics Denmark |