GASABO - The present annual estimates of Rwanda’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) are the best possible and as good as any in Africa, Tim Jones, a consultant on Rwanda’s economic statistics, has said.

This was during the first national accounts’ rebasing consultation workshop that took place on Monday at Hotel Novotel to brain storm on how to improve the country’s GDP estimates.

"After balancing estimates of supply and demand and collecting data from many sources including that from the informal sector survey, it is possible that Rwanda is doing extremely well,” Jones said.

He, however, also highlighted that it is very hard to be accurate about the growth rate because the annual estimates depend mostly on readily available data and several assumptions.

"In spite of the fact that things have changed and this is 2008, the growth rate will be calculated using 2006 prices which will call for some revision in relation to the level and growth rate of the GDP since 2001,” he explained.

At the same occasion, the Director General of the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda, Louis Munyakazi, said that it is very important to have statistics because they are needed for good governance and policy making.

"In order to co-ordinate and promote the development of national statistics, there is need for carrying out major censuses and surveys and estimating the GDP for good policy making,” Munyakazi said.

He also said that because many assumptions have to be made, over time, annual estimates may diverge from reality hence the necessity to establish a new benchmark year of 2006.

From 1995 onwards, the annual estimates were compiled systematically by the former statistics department but from the year 2006 a new benchmark was established on which the estimates are now based.

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