With the adoption of the European Statistics Code of Practice, Eurostat and the statistical institutes of the EU Member States, including NSO, have committed themselves to an encompassing approach towards high-quality statistics. The Code builds on a common definition of quality in statistics across the European Statistical System (ESS). It takes a holistic approach, ranging from governance and institutional matters to production processes and dissemination of statistics.
The European Statistics Code of Practice sets out 15 principles for the guidance of national statistical institutes and community statistical authorities.
The Code was adopted by the Statistical Programme Committee on 24 February 2005 and was promulgated in the Commission Recommendation of 25 May 2005 on the independence, integrity and accountabilty of the national and Community statistical authorities. The Code was revised by the European Statistical System Committee in September 2011.