Press Release No. 23/385

The Third Phase of the G20 Data Gaps Initiative (DGI-3) Starts to Deliver Insights for Action

November 8, 2023

Washington, DC : In October 2022, the G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (FMCBGs) welcomed the workplan on the DGI-3 and asked the IMF, the Financial Stability Board (FSB) and the Inter-Agency Group on Economic and Financial Statistics (IAG) to begin work on filling the identified 14 data gaps that impede the ability to develop economic and financial policy to address climate change, financial innovation, and inclusive growth. Over the last year, the statistical community has been working to address these gaps and to provide policymakers an enhanced toolbox to develop policy in these critical areas.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) today published the First Progress Report on the implementation of the DGI-3: People. Planet. Economy.

The report shows that substantial progress has been made in the implementation of the DGI-3 workplan. DGI-3 task teams have been established for all DGI-3 recommendations, and they conducted several virtual meetings and workshops. At the same time, the IAG lead agencies and FSB completed stocktaking exercises to assess data availability and establish methodologies and reporting templates.

A new progress reporting framework to help assess advancements in the implementation of the 14 DGI-3 recommendations has been agreed with the G20 and participating economies. The report includes a progress monitoring dashboard that provides a concise overview of such progress. Country notes explain in more detail the status of the DGI-3 data gaps identified based on a self-assessment by the G20 and participating economies, as well as specific accomplishments and challenges in each jurisdiction.

The starting point to address these data gaps differs across the 14 DGI-3 recommendations. In some cases, the G20 and participating economies are well advanced and can develop initial estimates within the next year. In other cases, significant conceptual and source data development work is required.

The report also highlights:

• Most of the progress has been achieved in the area of climate change. Progress has also been made in developing estimates of the distribution of income, consumption, savings, and wealth across households, while in the area of digitalization and financial innovation, the G20 and participating economies need further assistance and guidance on the implementation.

• Several G20 economies are already releasing Air Emission Accounts that, when combined with mainstream economic accounts, provide key insights into the greenhouse gas (GHG) emission intensities by industry. Early results for the G20 economies, indicate that GHG intensities have been falling across the G20 European economies for the better part of the last decade. The GHG emission intensities permit G20 policymakers to understand which industries are making progress towards lowering GHG emissions and whether policy measures are succeeding in decoupling GHG emissions from economic growth.

• Several G20 economies are regularly publishing estimates of the distribution of household income, consumption, and savings. These data will help policymakers go “beyond GDP” in their analysis, providing insight into the distributional effects of policies across the G20 economies.

To facilitate further progress, the 2024 DGI-3 work program will include an annual Global Conference planned for June 2024, thematic workshops, consultations, and bilateral meetings. The IMF, in close cooperation with the IAG and the FSB, will continue to monitor the implementation of the DGI-3 and report progress to the G20 FMCBGs, annually.

Notes on the Data Gaps Initiative (DGI)

In October 2009, the FSB and the IMF published The Financial Crisis and Information Gaps , a report which responded to a request from the G20 FMCBGs to explore information gaps and provide appropriate proposals for strengthening data collection. The report, which set out a series of recommendations to address identified data gaps, was endorsed by G20 FMCBGs and led to the first phase of work on the data gaps initiative (DGI-1). In September 2015, it was agreed that the DGI work should continue into a second phase (DGI-2), with the objective to ensure regular collection and dissemination of reliable and timely statistics for policy use. The DGI-2 concluded in December 2021. In the fall of 2021, the G20 FMCBGs endorsed the concept note for the third phase of the initiative (DGI-3) and the G20 welcomed the DGI-3 workplan in both the G20 FMCBGs October 2022 meeting and the G20 Bali Leaders’ Declaration—November 2022.

The main objective of the DGI-3 is to address the critical data gaps that exists in the face of the climate crisis, increasing economic polarization, and large-scale digital transformation. Its 14 recommendations are clustered around four statistical areas (i) climate change; (ii) household distributional information; (iii) Fintech and financial inclusion; and (iv) access to private sources of data and administrative data, and data sharing.

The member agencies of the Inter-Agency Group on Economic and Financial Statistics (IAG) are the Bank for International Settlements, European Central Bank, Eurostat, IMF (Chair), Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the United Nations and the World Bank. The FSB Secretariat participates in the IAG meetings.