United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC)

The United Nations Statistical Commission is the ultimate stakeholder of the International Comparison Program (ICP) deciding on the frequency and operational modality of the program. The ICP Global Office reports to the UNSC every year.

ICP Governing Board (GB)

The Governing Board, established by the UNSC, provides strategic leadership and is responsible for setting priorities, standards, and the work program for the ICP. The board sets the policies that govern the production of PPPs, approves methodological improvements, and conducts outreach and fundraising. It is responsible for setting up the ICP Technical Advisory Group, selecting its members, and periodically reviewing the technical research agenda and the survey and aggregation methods. It has the ultimate responsibility to review and approve any methodological innovations and methodological improvements put forward by the Technical Advisory Group. The most important function of the Governing Board is to ensure the timeliness and reliability of the results produced by the ICP following agreed policies, protocols, and methods ensuring the quality and integrity of results. The board also reviews and monitors the funding of the ICP and identifies strategies for sustained funding support for the ICP.

Technical Advisory Group (TAG) and Task Forces

The Technical Advisory Group and Tasks Forces are comprised of experts in the fields of index numbers, PPPs, price statistics, and national accounts. The TAG is entrusted with ensuring methodological soundness and overall quality in the PPP estimates and steering the ICP research agenda. The group works in close coordination with the ICP Global Office and the Inter-Agency Coordination Agency to identify and resolve technical issues on the compilation of PPPs and real expenditures.

ICP Inter-Agency Coordination Group (IACG)

Chaired by the World Bank, the Inter-Agency Coordination Group includes the RIAs, the OECD, Eurostat, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The Inter-Agency Coordination Group determines activities for data collection, validation, calculation, dissemination, and capacity building at the regional level. This group has a critical role in ensuring that all the regions adhere to common standards and protocols to ensure comparability across regions and the participating economies; establishing and working on timetables and work plans for data collection, validation, compilation of results; and, finally, disseminating results.

The Global Office

At the recommendation of the UNSC, the World Bank has assumed permanent responsibility for the ICP Global Office, responsible for global coordination and implementation of the ICP. It organizes and conducts meetings of the Inter-Agency Coordination Group and acts as its secretariat, responsible for day-to-day management, serves as the secretariat to the Governing Board and the Technical Advisory Group, and prepares submissions and annual reports to the UNSC.

Regional Implementing Agencies (RIAs)

The Regional Implementing Agencies carry out day-to-day management of the regional programs; plan and implement the regional ICP activities in line with the agreed timetables; ensure the quality of economy level and regional data and metadata; and conduct regular workshops on the preparation of item lists, regional validation of data, and the assessment of the ICP results for the region. The RIAs are also responsible for capacity-building activities within the region and provide technical assistance to the participating economies on the conduct of price surveys and subsequent validation of data. They provide the ICP Global Office with economy level and regional data and metadata for purposes of analysis and validation at the global level and for linking the regional results to calculate global results. The organizations acting as the RIAs are the:

• African Development Bank (AfDB) for the Africa region;
• Asian Development Bank (ADB) for the Asia and Pacific region;
• Interstate Statistical Committee of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS-STAT) for the Commonwealth of Independent States
• United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (UN-ECLAC) for the Latin America and the Caribbean region; and
• United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (UN-ESCWA) for the Western Asia region.

Regional Advisory Board (RAB)

In the ICP for Asia and the Pacific, the Regional Advisory Board is established to provide advice to the ICP Asia and the Pacific regional coordinator. The board includes representatives of economy-level and regional stakeholders. RAB is not an executive body nor involved in the day-to-day management of the ICP. Its roles are: to set regional goals, objectives, and priorities; to guide work program prepared by the regional coordinator who is responsible for the day-to-day management of the regional program; to review ICP progress and provide guidance in timely implementing ICP activities in line with methods prescribed by the Technical Advisory Group for the ICP and global practices; and provide guidance on the future direction of ICP in the region.

Implementing Agencies of the Participating Economies

The implementing agencies of the participating economies are responsible for ICP activities at the economy level. They are responsible for coordinating and implementing the ICP work program established at the regional level. As the timeliness and quality of price and national accounts data are fundamental to the ICP, the implementing agency in each economy plays a vital role in ensuring that the ICP surveys are conducted in a timely manner and quality assurance standards as prescribed by the regional coordinator are met. They are responsible for collecting and compiling data and metadata necessary for compiling PPPs and real expenditures. They periodically submit the data to their RIA and actively participate in regional workshops to discuss ICP operational guidelines and survey materials, undertake data validation, examine data and metadata quality, and to discuss preliminary and final ICP results for the region.