The role of the Internationl Household Survey Network and the Accelerated Data Program
International and bilateral agencies have invested considerable resources in supporting data collection activities in developing countries, with the main objective to generate data needed for the design, monitoring and assessment of development policies and programs. But the lack of data is still often invoked as a major obstacle to "managing for results". One reason is that many of the existing datasets remain unexploited. This presentation will provide an overview of the various causes -technical, legal, financial, institutional and others- and of the possible solutions to "unlock" the available data. The presentation will focus on the strategy being implemented by the International Household Survey Network (IHSN) and by the World Bank/OECD Accelerated Data Program (ADP) to assist developing countries in the establishment of proper national microdata archives.