In general, national statistics offices produce a range of key national economic indicators and population estimates. They may also produce other social, cultural, and environmental statistics, but not always. This paper defines the statistics generated by government agencies, whether from administrative or survey data, as official statistics.
One way to increase the usefulness of these statistics is to present them in forms that are easy for the user to interpret. Increasing computing power and the Internet have massively increased the ability to store, access, and analyse very large amounts of data. The Internet has itself become an analysis tool. This, together with the availability of many new open-source data visualisation methods and spatial tools, has enabled new ways of accessing and interpreting data. These new tools can open up the wealth of information held in official statistics to less statistically literate users, whether government advisors or members of the public. They are not simply presentation tools; they also enable new levels of data exploration and can be useful for the formulation of hypotheses.
This paper demonstrates some recent data visualisation applications that have been used with a variety of official statistics, gives examples of analytical or policy uses, and makes some suggestions for further enhancements. The visualisations include static graphs; dynamic graphs (that show changes over time); interactive graphs (that allow the user to explore and interrogate the data); and mapping tools and software that integrate standard statistical analysis, graphics, and maps.