For price statistics such as the Consumer Price Index (CPI), alternative data sources, including web-scraped and scanner data, have the potential to increase accuracy, improve timeliness, allow for greater granularity, as well as reduce data collection costs and response burden compared with using traditional sources alone.
This Stats Brief provides a summary of the experiences, achievements and lessons learned by the Statistics Agency under the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan (UZStat), who have undertaken a vigorous and productive modernization programme of their CPI, along with a set of recommendations that will be of relevance to all NSOs seeking to make similar use of alternative data sources for their price statistics.