Data collection options and countries currently covered

Several options of data collection are used at present to fill the ILO social social security inquiry

Option 1	Data collection at the country level
	The ideal case is a direct entry online by the national institutions themselves the Ministry of Finance for expenditure and financing on the national level and economic background information the Ministry of Labour, Health, etc for the scheme inventory and socio-economic background information Social security schemes for: scheme expenditure and financing, beneficiaries and protected persons, benefit and benefit levels The reality: a national coordinator and hard work of identifying schemes and looking for information.
Option 2	Using existing sources of information
	Objective	Inserting data from other sources and promoting the use of the social security inquiry tool by other organisations
	Advantages ...	Enhanced co-operation across organisations operation in the area of social protection statistics. There are clear advantages of joint work across notably ILO, ADB and OECD, including: minimising duplications and data-collection burden avoiding multiple requests to institutions and government agencies; harmonising methods (data collection as well as measurement); defining a minimum set of data and indicators to be collected and (over time) enhancing the comprehensiveness and scope of data collection; defining standards in the area of social protection statistics; v) joint fundraising to support the organisation of events of mutual interest. At present the main limitation is the lack of existing detailed data as required in the inquiry
Option 3	Import of existing data
	Concerns mainly OECD expenditure data on social protection from the SOCX database

The list of countries currently present in the ILO social security inquiry or in the process of data collection is presented below. Most of them show a very partial view of social protection schemes in the country which makes difficult the calculation of indicators at the macro level.

Source/ method of data collection	Countries covered by the ILO social security inquiry
National coordinator at the country level
	Albania Argentina Armenia Azerbaijan Bosnia and Herzegovina Brazil Bulgaria Burkina Faso Chile Croatia Cyprus Finland	Macedonia Ghana Kazakhstan Lesotho Malaysia Mexico Moldova, Republic of Mongolia Mozambique Namibia Peru	Poland Romania Senegal Sri Lanka Tanzania Thailand Vietnam Yemen Yugoslavia Zambia Zimbabwe
	Total countries : 34
Using existing sources
ISSA statistical database: covers Pensions and employment injury schemes	Bahrain Barbados Belize Benin British Virgin Islands Burundi Cameroon Chad Congo	Gambia Guinea Ivory Coast Jordan Kuwait Mauritania Morocco Niger Rwanda	Sierra Leone St. Vincent & Grenadine Sudan Togo Trinidad & Tobago Tunisia Uganda
	Total countries : 25
Asian Development Bank data (Social Protection Index project)	Bangladesh Bhutan Cambodia China Cook Islands Fiji India Indonesia Japan [completed with OECD data on expenditure]	Korea, Republic of [completed with OECD data on expenditure] Kyrgyzstan Laos Maldives Marshall Islands Nauru Nepal Pakistan	Papua New Guinea Philippines Solomon Islands Tajikistan Tonga Tuvalu Uzbekistan Vanuatu
	Total countries : 25
Other: national reports and websites	Aruba (Neth.) Bolivia Chinese Taipei	Dominica Jamaica Mauritius Saudi Arabia	South Africa St. Kitts & Nevis Turkey
	Total countries : 10
Ready to be imported [data on expenditure only]	Australia Austria Belgium Canada Czech Republic Denmark France Germany Greece	Hungary Iceland Ireland Italy Lithuania Luxembourg Netherlands New Zealand Norway	Portugal Slovak Republic Slovenia Spain Sweden Switzerland United Kingdom United States
	Total countries: 26
Current process of data collection
By field office	Algeria Cape Verde Egypt	Lebanon Libya Arab Jamahiriy Oman	Qatar Syrian Arab Rep
	Total countries : 9

Data collection options and countries currently covered

National coordinator at the country level

Using existing sources

Current process of data collection