Price Statistics Required By Developing Countries For National Accounting Purposes

In both developed and developing countries, the national accounting statistician who wishes to establish a composite set of values in current and base year prices is faced with a series of difficulties arising from a lack of indicators which are adequate for relating quantities and values within the national accounting framework. Consequently, ad hoc solutions are extensively adopted and use is made of price data which in the majority of cases have been collected for completely different purposes. The inter‐relationship of prices, quantities and values fundamental to the compatibility of the national accounts can therefore be, and often is, a rather tenuous one. In the case of many developing countries, the situation is accentuated by a very volatile behaviour of prices, a greater impact of price change and a much greater scarcity of useable statistical material. In addition, since structural change is frequently implicit in a development process, the pattern of values and of prices is often variable and irregular—this in turn creates problems in determining relative importance, in assigning weights and in imputing for prices of items not directly entering into the calculation of the indicators. This paper analyses the series which are most commonly available, it points out the major deficiencies or limitations and it attempts to formulate a few guide‐lines for determining priorities called for in an integrated network of price statistics.