Susanne Schnorr
Backer
Head of Unit
Federal Statistical Office of Germany
Germany

Biography
Dr. Susanne Schnorr-Baecker is head of unit ”Coordination, regional statistics, indicator systems“ at the Federal Statistical Office of Germany. She studied law and economics and finished her studies with a PhD on regional simulation. As a member of several expert and working groups at national, European, supra- and international level she has in-depth-knowledge concerning the statistical monitoring of political strategies at macro and micro level. In particular she is Official Statistics’ expert for INSPIRE Annex III Themes, the European strategy “Europe 2020”, OECD’s “Progress measurement/Better life initiative”, the “Sustainable Development Goals” in the post 2015-process and GGIM at the United Nations.

Abstract
INSPIRE, Sustainable Development and Measuring Progress from German Official Statistics’ Perspective

Measuring sustainable development and progress is one of the major aims of official statistics in modern days. The work on the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) as the successor of the millennium development goals has almost been finished. The new approach consists of 17 goals and 169 targets. It will be relevant for all United Nations member states even at subnational and local level. For measuring progress regularly a comprehensive and systematic statistical indicator system has to be developed by the end of this year. The fact that the information and statistical data for monitoring progress even at subnational and local level is only partly available led to several initiatives ranging from the usage of new data sources such as big data (including satellite images) and the foundation of UN GGIM Europe to meet the users’ needs more appropriately. It is generally acknowledged that geographic information will become increasingly important for showing statistical data in a harmonised manner. INSPIRE with its several thematic themes could provide a good basis for showing sustainable progress in the EU member states. The aim of the presentation is to show the impact of the reformed sustainable development goals and related strategies at national level from official statistics’ point of view. It will also give some insight in major challenges and new developments official statistics is faced with towards measuring sustainable development and progress.