Special Data Dissemination Standard
Specifications of Population Statistics
The specifications of the economic and financial data for the IMF's Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS) are in terms of:
| Coverage: | the categories and components that are most important in shedding light on macroeconomic performance and policy. The standard identifies for each of the four sectors of the economy (i) a comprehensive statistical framework; (ii) data that permit frequent tracking of the principal measures in the framework; and (iii) other data relevant to the sector. |
| Periodicity: | the frequency of compilation--daily, weekly, monthly, etc. |
| Timeliness: | the maximum lapse of time between a reference date (or close of a reference period) and dissemination--for example, one month. |
Please click here for information about the possible use of flexibility options for this data category.
Addendum: Population
| Coverage: | The standard prescribes population because of its usefulness as a scaling factor, e.g., in GDP per capita. This category refers to the total size of the population. No component detail is prescribed, but dissemination of distributions such as by age and sex is encouraged. |
| Periodicity: | Annual |
| Timeliness: | Timeliness is not specified, but the standard implies that data should be disseminated with an annual periodicity and on a regular basis. |