As an effort towards a more transparent energy sector and realising the importance of energy data in policymaking, Suruhanjaya Tenaga (Energy Commission) and the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) jointly organised a workshop on Energy Statistics. During the workshop in Kuala Lumpur, Energy Commission launched its mobile application on energy statistics known as “MyEnergyStats”. The workshop was welcomed by the Energy Commission’s Chairman, Dato’ Abdul Razak bin Abdul Majid, followed by an opening speech from UNSD’s Statistician Industrial and Energy Statistics Section, Leonardo Souza.

The three-day (21-23 November 2017) workshop aimed to provide knowledge and practices on energy statistics programmes in ASEAN Member States (AMS). It was attended by around 100 participants consisting of senior managers from national statistics offices and senior representatives from ministries or government agencies, as well as self-funded representatives from international and regional organisations like energy data providers.

Beni Suryadi, ASEAN Centre for Energy’s Manager for Policy Research and Analytics Programme, presented the work on ASEAN Energy Database System. The workshop mainly discussed methodological work of energy statistics by the UNSD which is based on the International Recommendations for Energy Statistics. It emphasised the urgency to follow the Standard International Energy Product Classification for each energy product. All participants learned how to develop energy balance in the context of their respective countries. Other topics related to energy balance such as data quality and data dissemination were discussed during the workshop. The workshop also shared another international organisation’s experience on energy statistics work; Asia Pacific Energy Research Centre (APERC). Furthermore, several AMS provided country practices on energy statistics work including data collection methodology and energy balances development. (PA/Featured photo credit: Suruhanjaya Tenaga)