“Mirror Statistics” and Defining Foreign Trade Indicators in the Republic of Azerbaijan

There is no extended research of public policy on regulation of the activities for organization and development of the statistics in Azerbaijan. Measures taken to improve and reconcile this field with the international standards are not considered to be satisfactory yet. Some of the statistical data vital for the country’s economic and social life can easily be challenged even upon the initial comparison. For example, when comparing Azerbaijan to other countries, according to the official statistics, Azerbaijan has better indicators for the level of poverty compared to Great Britain, better indicators for the Gini (inequality) coefficient compared to Switzerland and better indicators for the level of unemployment compared to United States. Thus, the official statistics distorts the reality in some fields.

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