Sao Tome and Principe - SADC Regional Statistics Project : Additional Financing

Overview & Synopsis

The development objective of the SADC Regional Statistics Project for the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe is to strengthen the institutional capacity of the Southern African Development Community and participating countries to produce, disseminate, and use quality statistics while increasing regional harmonization and collaboration. The additional financing is requested to close a financing gap caused by cost overruns in the Population and Housing Census and the Household Budget Survey (IOF) due to inflation, exchange rate movements, and the transfer of certain census activities from the STP Digital Project, and to scale up selected activities to address remaining data gaps in priority sectors. The Bank will support completion of core statistical operations, including thematic analyses and dissemination of census results, the IOF 2026, business and labor force surveys, consolidation of recently rebased national accounts, and development of a new Consumer Price Index basket. The financing will also introduce the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) to update data on health, education, child welfare, water and sanitation, and living conditions, and a thematic agricultural survey to complement the recent agricultural census and inform sector planning, climate risk monitoring, and food security. Institutional strengthening will include revision of the legal framework for the national statistical system to reinforce the mandate and data access of the Instituto Nacional de Estatística (INE), scholarships and short-term training for statistical skills, ICT equipment, and limited rehabilitation of the INE office in Príncipe with solar installations to improve operational resilience. Data dissemination and use will be enhanced through modernization of INE’s website and dashboards, partnerships for academic access to anonymized datasets, and technical support to use data in fiscal policy. The project intends to increase the data collection and openness score, improve the quality and harmonization of key indicators, expand user access and downloads, publish user satisfaction scores, and produce climate-relevant datasets that strengthen evidence-based policymaking.