Yemen received a certificate of merit yesterday for the best Arab Statistical Work, 2008, After being selected by the Arab Institute for Statistical Training and Researches for its work "Basic Services Map-Statistical Atlas" presented by the Central Statistical Organization (CSO).

His Excellency/ Dr. Ma'roof Al-Bakheet, the prime minister of Jordan, has given the certificate to Dr. Amin Mohammed Mohie Al-Din, Chairman of the Central Statistical Organization (CSO) once it was announced in the opening session of the First Arab Statistical Conference that launched its work yesterday in Amman, the Capital of Jordan.

In his announcement to Yemen News Agency "Saba'a", Dr. Amin has expressed a high sense of pride that Yemen has received this certificate in this conference held under the motto "No development without Statistics" and attended by Arab statistical organizations and other specialized international and regional organizations. Dr. Amin has also noted that this work has been selected among nine Arab Works according to precise mechanism and terms examined and studied by specialized scientific committee to judge the competing works and finally choose the best among them.

 Dr. Amin has also asserted that this work Yemen received a certificate for is one of the important strategic projects that the CSO has been carrying out in the period from 2005 to 2008. This work exemplified by the "Basic Services Map" provides a very efficient mechanism for linking the location to its information in terms of population clusters, number of inhabitants and the service establishments that people benefit from. Dr. Amin has explained that the importance of this map lies in its being one of the key recent and scientific approaches of collecting, updating and classifying data on geographical locations from its primary sources and of knowing the magnitude of population density and the infrastructure in the different areas in Yemen including other services such as health, education, electricity, water, roads …etc, and then reflecting all that on maps to be linked to other data such as population, buildings, housings and establishments to assist setting strategies and policies of rural and urban development, plan cities and distribute services.