Windhoek — The German government is supporting the newly founded Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA), providing financial and technical assistance.

Officials of the NSA have already been to Germany to explore areas of cooperation with the German Federal Statistical Office (Destatis).

The German government has also contributed approximately N$1.9 million towards the establishment of a fully functional and state-of-the-art data processing centre.

Construction work on the centre and technical equipment is already underway and the centre is expected to be completed by early next year.

"This joint initiative will contribute to the government's objective to make relevant, accurate and timely statistics available for the private sector, civil society and evidence-based policy design and decision making in Namibia," reads a statement from the German Embassy.

The NSA was established as an independent, central statistical authority and repository for all statistics produced in Namibia. One of the roles of the NSA is to collect and disseminate statistics and spatial data, while educating the public on the use of statistics.

A department within the National Planning Commission secretariat previously carried out those functions.

The German government has committed itself to support the establishment of an independent NSA office and has already donated six off-road vehicles for use in the ongoing Labour Force Survey 2012. German Ambassador to Namibia Onno Huckmann handed the vehicles to the Statistician General Dr John Steytler.