On 24-25 April 2019 Statistics Poland organized a meeting with the management and experts from the statistical offices of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, the Republic of North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

The idea of the meeting was consistent with aims and principles of the Berlin Process, paving the way to future enlargement of the European Union. Its aim is to strengthen regional cooperation among the countries of the Western Balkans and EU members active in the Berlin Process initiative as well as to foster their integration with the EU.  In 2019 Poland has taken over the chairmanship in the Berlin Process. In July 2019 a Western Balkan Summit, being a  yearly gathering of high representatives from the Western Balkan countries with their counterparts from the European Union, will be one of the central events of the Polish presidency in the Berlin Process.

Along with the representatives of all Western Balkan countries, the meeting was attended by Mr. Eduardo Barredo Capelot - Director of the Department of Methodology, Dissemination and Cooperation in the European Statistical System in Eurostat, as well as by the representatives of the OECD:  Ms. Anita Richter and Mr. Filip Stefanovic from the South East Europe Division, representatives of the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Entrepreneurship and Technology.

Statistical offices of Greece and Denmark were also represented by Mr. Athanasios Thanopoulos - President of ELSTAT and Mr. Maciej Truszczyński – SDG expert in Statistics Denmark.

The meeting started with a session on view of data users on the role of statistical offices in developing evidence-based policies and their significance in the decision making process.

During the first day the discussion gathered representatives of all interested parties: administration, NGOs and businesses and  was mainly focused on the monitoring of the Sustainable Development Goals.

The second day of the meeting was dedicated to different methods and approaches to population censuses as well as population migrations statistics, geostatistics and Earth observation. The above areas were chosen according to the interests and needs expressed by the Balkan countries on various occasions and fora.