Summary:EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
? In response to a request from the Malawi authorities and in consultation with the African
Department (AFR), I undertook a technical assistance (TA) mission to Zomba during the
period September 16–27, 2013 to assist with improving prices statistics, including the full
conversion to direct pricing for the import and export price indexes (MXPI) and reviewing
the new producer price index (PPI). This activity (14STJ6300) was funded by the East
Africa Technical Assistance Center (East AFRITAC)1 and undertaken within the context
of the following project: Price Statistics STA_MWI_2008_05.
? Important aspects for the mission to address included the following: (i) review the work
undertaken to date on developing experimental unit value based MXPI; (ii) prepare
detailed plans for the development of quarterly import and export price surveys;
(iii) develop the methodology for the replacement of the unit values with survey-based
prices in the index compilation systems; (iv) review the new PPI and consider any
possible future enhancements; (v) provide training to staff on data collection and index
compilation; and (vi) document the methodology and computational procedures
developed during the mission.
? In order to make as much progress as possible in relation to all the phases of the index
construction during the period of the mission, the focus was placed on the development of
an import price index (MPI). The documentation relates to an MPI but the Malawi
National Statistics Office (MNSO) will be well positioned to apply the same techniques,
principles and procedures to develop an export price index (XPI). The development of the
XPI will be more straightforward; experience has shown that the development and
maintenance of an MPI is much more complex.
? The MNSO proceeded to follow the work program developed during the previous mission
to initially compile experimental, unit value-based indexes then progressively replace the
unit value price indicators with direct survey-based prices.
? However, MNSO could not proceed to compile the MPI because of problems with the
credibility of the unit values. This follow-up mission undertook an analysis of the sample
of import unit values by country selected for the MPI and found major problems with
most of the basic data, particularly in relation to the reported quantities and units of
quantity. Therefore, it is not feasible to proceed to compile the indexes until quarterly
transaction prices are available from import and export price surveys.
? It is essential that resources be provided to fund a program of import and export price
survey initialization interviews and the subsequent ongoing quarterly price collections.
