Press Release No. 05/285

On December 15, 2005, Morocco became the 62nd subscriber to the International Monetary Fund's Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS).

Mr. Robert W. Edwards, Director of the IMF Statistics Department, applauded Morocco's subscription to the SDDS and noted that this is a major step for Moroccan official statistics and for its data users. Mr. Edwards noted that Morocco's subscription to the SDDS represents a strong commitment to transparency and a significant achievement in implementing internationally accepted good practices in statistics. Morocco is the third country in the Middle East to subscribe to the SDDS.

The SDDS, established by the IMF in March 1996, is intended to guide members in the provision of their economic and financial data to the public. Subscription to the SDDS is expected to enhance the availability of timely and comprehensive statistics, thereby contributing to the pursuit of sound macroeconomic policies and the improved functioning of financial markets. The SDDS identifies four dimensions of data dissemination-the data: coverage, periodicity, and timeliness; access by the public; the integrity of the disseminated data; and the quality of the disseminated data. Although subscription is voluntary, a subscribing member commits to observe the standard and to provide information (metadata) to the IMF about its data dissemination practices. This information is made publicly available on the IMF's Dissemination Standards Bulletin Board (DSBB).

The DSBB now provides comprehensive documentation in English on Morocco's statistical practices for SDDS data categories, hyperlinked to actual country data included in the mandatory National Summary Data Page maintained by the Ministry of Finance and Privatization.