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The Government On-Line Strategy and Statistics Canada

Statistics Canada is a key player and content provider to the Government of Canada’s newly redesigned Canada Site, www.canada.gc.ca. The development of this site—in conjunction with the enhancements to the services Statistics Canada provides on its own website and its continuing transformation of services online—is part of the Government On-Line (GOL) initiative. This initiative is a cornerstone of the government’s commitment to provide Canadians with online access to all federal information and services by 2005.

To ensure more seamless access to federal services and to provide the public with greater ease of use, the government has structured its site according to broad client groups, known as portals or clusters, rather than along departmental lines. And, because Statistics Canada has information and statistics on many subjects, it has been called upon to participate in most of these clusters. The Agency’s challenge is to structure our information according to the design of these portals and to arrange the necessary interfaces to our data holdings.

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• Our mission, Our vision
• Informing Canadians
• Contacting Canadians
• Consulting Canadians
• GOL contacts at Statistics Canada

 

Our Mission, Our Vision

As the national statistical agency, Statistics Canada is mandated to collect, compile, analyse and publish information on Canada’s economy, institutions and population. Its mission—to provide objective information and analyses about the evolution of our society and economy to Canadians and their elected representatives—is fundamentally important to an open, democratic society.

Statistics Canada’s effectiveness in this role depends on its credibility, on the relevance of its information, and on the accessibility and timeliness of its products and services. Since the early 1990s, the Internet has played an increasingly significant and strategic role in ensuring Statistics Canada’s effectiveness. Here, the Agency’s goal is simple—to provide the widest possible public with remarkably detailed content on practically every aspect of Canada at a single point of contact.

To determine the key service requirements of our statistical consumers, our respondents, and our stakeholders, Statistics Canada monitors its website traffic, as well as the reporting burden it places on its survey respondents. It conducts market research and Internet usability studies—most recently to measure the readiness and willingness of businesses and households to use the Internet for survey response.

Statistics Canada’s electronic and Internet services are designed to complement existing channels of communication between the Agency and its clients: As always, Canadians will be able to choose how they wish to access Statistics Canada—by mail, by telephone or electronically.

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Informing Canadians: Communication and Dissemination

Canadians judge the relevance of Statistics Canada by the content, timeliness and relevance of the information it provides. For this reason, publishing has always been a key service provided by the Agency. The Internet has become our users’ preferred channel to access our published statistics and has allowed us to reach many more Canadians than ever achieved through traditional channels.

Statistics Canada has already put many innovative services online, from publications to electronic data, census to survey information. The Agency first embraced the Internet as a communications and dissemination channel in 1995 and through this medium it now reaches more Canadians than ever before. The website is updated with newly released data each working day at 8:30 AM through The Daily, Canadian Statistics, downloadable publications, and the CANSIM database. Together with the popular Community Profiles module, these components of the website account for 70% of the traffic on the site.

Launched in 1995, Statistics Canada’s website offers an increasingly vast array of easily accessible statistics for a wide range of information users, including

• an online catalogue of all products and services (March, 1995)
• an electronic ordering service for Depository libraries and e-pubs of many titles (June, 1996)
• an e-commerce service that enables researchers to locate and purchase data from the CANSIM database online (July, 1996), followed by the new CANSIM database—a corporate data warehouse with enhanced functionality, also available through e-commerce (April 2001)
• electronic delivery of all our published electronic data files to universities and colleges through the Data Liberation Initiative (August, 1996)
• an e-commerce service providing access to the International Trade database (February, 1997)
• the Learning Resources module, which supports our outreach program to elementary, secondary and post-secondary schools (May, 1998)
• the Integrated Metadatabase, accessible in the Definitions, data sources and methods module, which provides comprehensive information about our surveys and their outputs (November 2000).

Our clientele include all levels of government, accounting for 23% of daily visits to www.statcan.ca; students, 20%; business services, accounting for 15%; teachers and students, 13%; finance and insurance industries, 8%. Communications and utilities, as well as health and social services users account for 7% of daily traffic on our site and manufacturing concerns account for 5%.

The evolution of the site has been driven by client research including online surveys, focus testing and observational research. Through this research, Canadians have told us that they appreciate the vast array of statistics on our site and the currency of our site, which is updated daily.

Major innovations and enhancements are planned for the Agency’s key dissemination and communication service, including:

• CANSIM. Plans have been established to enhance CANSIM, the Agency’s central dissemination data warehouse from which Statistics Canada’s data-output products and services are dynamically published—via improved documentation, higher quality metadata and more descriptive and user-friendly labelling.
• Canada’s Geographic Hierarchy online. By bringing Statistics Canada’s geographic hierarchy online, the boundaries for all levels of geography will become available to clients through a map interface. This interface will integrate basic population and dwelling counts for blocks, municipalities, neighbourhoods and cities, as well as for the provinces and Canada, making it easier for clients to regroup Statistics Canada’s geographies to satisfy their specific data needs.
• Website technologies. Statistics Canada regularly enhances its website and website technologies as technologies improve and become available. Its current plans include the addition of a more robust search engine and enhanced metatagging. As well, the Agency plans to update its online cataloguing and page design, and expects to introduce a comprehensive content management system for the site to facilitate access in the face of emerging technologies and GOL-related sites.
• Integrated Metadatabase. The Agency plans to pursue the enhancement of its Integrated Metadatabase (IMDB)—a corporate repository of information on each of Statistics Canada’s active surveys (numbering about 350). The enhancements will ensure that the database maintains its use as a key information resource both for corporate knowledge-management and all users of the Agency’s data.
• Internet distribution of 2001 Census data. This will include greater volumes of data, as well as reference products, mapping and analytical articles. Census 2001 data are available on the Internet, beginning March 12, 2002. Final releases are scheduled for early 2004.
• Personalization of information services. This project ranges from the provision of a simple listserv (already available) to the development or enabling of fully personalized databases. This initiative is dependant both on available software and privacy and confidentiality concerns among web users.
• E-mail management system. The Agency intends to implement an e-mail management system to handle the inquiries received from website visitors efficiently and effectively.

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Contacting Canadians: Improving data collection and reporting

Statistics Canada administers over 400 surveys, ranging in size from the Unified Enterprise Survey of 54,000 businesses to the Census at 13 million households. Our respondents comprise Canadian businesses, including agricultural operations, provincial and territorial governments, and all Canadian households.

The survey methods currently used to collect the information are as diverse as the response communities that our surveys target. Statistics Canada has long recognized the opportunity and strategic value of the online channel: questionnaires for some surveys have been available in electronic format since the early 1990s. In this light, the transition to online data collection seems a natural step for Statistics Canada, which has assigned a very high priority to the development of an effective capacity for electronic data collection.

Statistics Canada recognizes that it is very likely that well before the 2006 Census, a large proportion of Canadians, particularly younger Canadians and Canadian business, may prefer the option of filing their survey and census returns electronically. However, the Agency’s primary concerns—and legislated responsibility—are to protect the privacy and confidentiality of all respondents, as well as the quality of the data it collects.

To ensure that confidentiality, privacy and data quality are not compromised, the Agency has adopted a controlled and evolutionary approach to electronic data collection. The Agency has begun this evolutionary process by introducing pilot projects for a diverse range of important surveys involving respondents from households, universities, businesses, and federal departments. Pilot projects include, most recently, the 2001 Census of Population, the Annual Retail Trade Survey, the Unified Enterprise Survey and the Business Payroll Survey.

The Agency is committed meanwhile to ongoing research and communication with its survey respondents on this issue, recently conducting an international conference on electronic data reporting issues. Respondents cite saving time, convenience (24/7 availability), and additional privacy as the three most important benefits of an electronic reporting option. Statistics Canada understands and shares respondents’ concerns regarding privacy and confidentiality; once Statistics Canada is satisfied that electronic reporting security issues can be satisfactorily addressed, it anticipates that the benefits to respondents of online reporting options will in turn improve survey response, the quality of source data and, ultimately, data output.

What then is the future of electronic data reporting at Statistics Canada? Gradually over the next three years, over 50 business and agriculture surveys, as well as some household surveys (the Household Spending Survey), will provide respondents the option of reporting electronically. Implementation will proceed survey by survey such that lessons learned from one survey can be applied to the next. Plans are also underway to develop PRESS-b, a Personalized Reporting and Exchange Statistical Site designed to streamline the significant reporting effort of large businesses. Finally, in April 2004, Statistics Canada will stage a full dress rehearsal of the electronic data reporting option for the 2006 Census of Population.

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Consulting Canadians: Enhancing stakeholder access

Statistics Canada relies on the support and advice of a large and diverse group of stakeholders to succeed in its mission of informing Canadian citizens, businesses, and governments about the evolution of their society and economy and to promote a high quality national statistical system.

The Agency’s stakeholders include the ministries of various levels of government, the media, business and labour unions, the academic and library sectors, foreign and international bodies, and the Canadian public, as well as the qualified professionals from many fields of study that it recruits from across the country.

These groups help Statistics Canada meet its goals for data collection, dissemination and communication, and advise on the relevance of its programs as data users. Their involvement ensures that Statistics Canada’s program evolves to meet the changing information needs of a society that is itself in transition.

Advisory committees and councils, federal–provincial–territorial committees, bilateral relationships with key federal departments, and user consultation forums are some of the traditional mechanisms than enable the Agency to interact effectively with its stakeholders. Statistics Canada has made significant advances in the use of the Internet to facilitate the functioning of these mechanisms and to manage its relationships with these groups:

• The media: The Daily published since 1937 became electronic in March 1995. The Daily is an electronic service that targets Canada’s news media to create broad public awareness through them of new data releases—increasing the visibility to all Canadians of the country’s current social and economic conditions.
• Educators and students: In July, 1996, Statistics Canada launched its first education module on www.statcan.ca to provide information tailored to the curricula of elementary and secondary schools throughout Canada. Officially launched in May 1998 as the Learning Resources module, these resources, which include our electronic education database E-STAT, are designed to increase students’ awareness of Canadian social and economic conditions and to encourage developing statistical literacy.
• Federal, provincial and territorial partners: In October 1996, the Agency created an Extranet for provincial and territorial statistical focal points to enable the sharing of information provided by Statistics Canada. In January 1997, Statistics Canada created an Extranet to serve specifically our federal, provincial and territorial partners in the Justice Statistics program.
• Universities and colleges: In November 1996, Statistics Canada established the Data Liberation Initiative along with its partners in colleges and universities. This program provides affordable and equitable access to Canadian data for teaching and research, as well as a Canada-wide learning network of data experts and users. The result has been a significant increase in the use of Canadian data in post secondary education.
• Depository Libraries: In March 1997, Statistics Canada created an electronic publications service providing electronic texts of many Statistics Canada publications. Currently 80 publication titles are provided through this service. In May 1999, we added an electronic checklist to the service to enable Depository Libraries to order print publications via the Internet.
• Respondents: In November 2000, we created a respondent relations module on www.statcan.ca to provide information to survey respondents on surveys currently in the field including complete descriptions of the survey’s purpose, the types of information being collected, collection methods, confidentiality policy and contact information.

Statistics Canada is currently leading a short-term project to

• create an inter-jurisdictional data exchange and knowledge sharing environment. This is a pilot program that will be used to select valuable activities and extend these to stakeholder communities with similar needs;
• create an online training facility that would provide health professionals with access to the information and skills they need to use community-level health data for evidence-based planing and evaluation work;
• enhance the extranet facility to allow information sharing among agencies from all levels of government that are responsible for the administration of justice in Canada;
• develop a secure online service that will allow federal, provincial, territorial and municipal education agencies managed access to detailed microdata for planning and evaluation purposes.

Looking farther ahead, the Agency will explore how it can fully exploit the Internet to enhance our relationships with stakeholders. Our objective is to enable much broader participation in these activities, to build partnerships and to allow electronic communications to take place with an immediacy that is not possible today.

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GOL contacts at Statistics Canada

For more information about electronic dissemination at Statistics Canada, please contact:

For more information about electronic data reporting at Statistics Canada, please contact:

For more information about Statistics Canada and GOL, or for information on Statistics Canada’s online services for its stakeholders, please contact:

For additional information on the GOL initiative, visit the Treasury Board Secretariat’s GOL website at www.gol-ged.gc.ca