The Statistical Conference of the Americas of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) is a subsidiary body of the Commission established pursuant to Economic and Social Council resolution 2000/7, in which the Conference was entrusted with the following mandates, among others: to promote the development and improvement of national statistics and work to ensure that they are comparable internationally, bearing in mind the recommendations of the United Nations Statistical Commission, the specialized agencies and other relevant organizations; to promote international, regional and bilateral cooperation among national offices and international and regional agencies; and to draw up a biennial programme of regional and international cooperation activities which, subject to the availability of resources, will meet the needs of the countries of the region.

The 2018-2019 biennial programme of regional and international cooperation activities of the Statistical Conference of the Americas of ECLAC is framed within the Strategic Plan 2015-2025, which established as the pillars of action of the Conference the achievement of more robust institutionality and a stronger governing role for national statistical offices; the development of human resources and statistical production in order to ensure quality; and regional and international coordination and cooperation for the development of official statistics in the region.

At this meeting the States members will examine the outcomes of the biennial programme of regional and international activities, 2018-2019, endorse the establishment of working groups for the period 2020-2021 and elect the new Executive Committee of the Conference for 2020-2021.

A High-level seminar on the future of economic statistics in Latin America and the Caribbean will take place on 18 November ahead of the meeting of the Conference. The purpose of this event is to discuss data needs for evidence-based policymaking, recent experiences in innovation in statistical production and the integration of data sources, and institutional mechanisms for developing economic statistics.