Recommendations are presented to improve statistical capacities in prison systems in Latin America and the Caribbean, a new challenge is to implement them

On 3 July, representatives of the national statistical offices (NSOs) of Peru, Mexico and the Dominican Republic participated in the last meeting of the Working Group (WG) on institutional capacities to produce statistics on prison systems in Latin America and the Caribbean.

At the meeting, the National Institute of Statistics and Geography of Mexico (INEGI), coordinating body of the WG, in collaboration with the UNODC-INEGI Centre of Excellence presented a summary of the latest draft of the document. They highlighted the lack of adequate human, technological and financial resources, training programs to produce statistical information; as well as the lack of coordination and cooperation mechanisms between the penitentiary systems and the NSOs for designing, producing, and disseminating statistical information on the subject.

Adrián Franco, the INEGI vice-president of the National Subsystem of Information on Government, Public Security and the Administration of Justice, emphasized the importance of this document as a first step to improve and diversify the sources of statistical information on prison systems, based not only on the use of administrative records but also on the design and implementation of censuses and surveys on the subject.

Andri Montero, from the National Statistics Office of the Dominican Republic, and Juan Trejo, from the National Institute of Statistics and Informatics of Peru, expressed their satisfaction with the progress and efforts made, as well as with the clarity of the document, which will contribute to achieving a wider scope.

Finally, Luisa Sánchez-Iriarte, from the UNODC-INEGI Centre of Excellence, underlined the importance of this document as a reference for improving statistical capacity to generate information on prison systems at the regional and international levels.