On September 22–23, 2026, the Meeting of the Policy Group on Statistical Cooperation took place in Chisinau, organized by the Statistical Office of the European Union (Eurostat) in collaboration with the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) of the Republic of Moldova.

The PGSC meeting is an annual forum organized by the European Commission that brings together representatives from Eurostat and the national statistical offices of the countries involved in the European Union’s enlargement process. The meeting provides a framework for discussing priorities and challenges in the development of official statistics, progress in aligning with European standards, and directions for strengthening statistical cooperation in the context of European integration.

The event will be attended by representatives of Eurostat, as well as heads and other representatives of the statistical offices of the candidate countries and potential candidate for EU membership: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Türkie, Ukraine, Kosovo, and Moldova.

In her speech, Mariana Kotzeva, Eurostat Director-General, presented therecent developments and priorities of the European Statistical System. She welcomed the continuing efforts of the national statistical authorities to align their statistical systems with the EU standards.  

„Eurostat will continue to work closely with the national statistical institutes from the enlargement countries and provide technical support to align their statistics with EU standards. The enlargement process is also an opportunity for the EU Member States to exchange experience and knowledge with these countries”, said Ms Kotzeva.

A representative of the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Enlargement and the Eastern Neighborhood (DG ENEST) provided an overview of recent developments in the EU’s enlargement process, and participants from the enlargement countries presented their main achievements over the past year.

Eurostat representatives, in turn, presented information on key steps, milestones and requirements for provisionally closing Chapter 18, “Statistics” and prerequisites for compiling intra-EU trade statistics after accession to the EU. Other topics presented and discussed during the meeting included: the ongoing round of peer reviews in the enlargement and Eastern European neighbourhood countries, the European System of National and Regional Accounts, data governance, the use of artificial intelligence in producing and disseminating official statistics, and many others.

Representatives of the enlargement countries discussed the current challenges and future plans in the process of European integration and exchanged views on how the cooperation in statistics can support them in this process.

Oleg Cara, General Director of the NBS, presented the information regarding the progress achieved by the Republic of Moldova related to the process of harmonizing national statistics with EU standards. “Chapter 18 ‘Statistics,’ involves not only aligning the regulatory and methodological framework with the EU acquis, but also strengthening the capacity of the entire statistical system to produce high-quality data that is relevant to society and comparable at the European level. Participation in the meeting of the Policy Group on Statistical Cooperation gives us the opportunity to exchange experiences with countries in the enlargement process and to discuss common priorities on the path toward integration into the European Statistical System.”, Oleg Cara noted.

The meeting provided participants with an opportunity to strengthen dialogue and cooperation in the field of statistics, to exchange experiences, and to identify common directions for the development of national statistical systems in the context of the process of accession to the European Union.

It is worth noting that the Meeting was followed, on September 24, by the High-Level Conference titled “Harnessing Geospatial Information for Enhanced Statistical Production and Dissemination to Support EU Integration”, organized by the NBS with support from Eurostat, through the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance.