Sharjah Forum Highlights Data Collection Strategies in Conflict Zones

The session of the Regional Data and Community Development Forum, which took place at the Jawaher Reception and Convention Centre in Sharjah on the first day of the forum, was devoted to the topic of data collection in conflict areas. The session titled; ‘‘Strategies for Data provision in conflict and Humanitarian Crisis in the Arab World welcomed the audience to a very crucial topic of statistics in the Arab World.

Ismail Lubad is an expert in statistics at the UN ESCWA and the primary discussant of the panel; Marwn Khawaja is the chief of the Demographic and Social Statistics Section at UN ESCWA and Magued Osman is the CEO of Baseera and ex Egyptian Minster of Communications and Information Technology. The moderator of the discussion was Ahmed Hussain, Senior Statistics Advisor at the Ministry of Development Planning and Statistics of the State of Qatar, – QSS.

Lubad further explained how statistics can help in framing policies of the countries particularly the regions experiencing socio-economic problems as a result of conflicts . He mainly focused on data within UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda regarding the relevance of fundamental data to its agenda of development in countries experiencing conflicts.

He added that where there are no stable authorities, the collection of such data turns into an incredibly challenging process, for example, in Gaza or in Syria, where the ongoing fighting negatively affect the stability of infrastructures and data relevance. He said that coordinating statistical techniques in such settings is a formidable task since it affects planning and crisis response.

Osman explained how the use of technology may help overcome barriers expressed above. He talked about the application of AI and satellite and cloud to capture and store data in areas where conventional approaches are impractical. He also clarified the idea of cooperation with international actors, stating, peaceful countries must share their access to data and experience in restoring affected regions with conflicted ones to smoothly carry out data collection during peace-building processes.