New Delhi, Nov. 12 -- Over the past two years, India's National Statistics Office (NSO) has witnessed a series of reforms that have improved the periodicity of surveys, shored up the credibility of macroeconomic datasets, and fostered a more open relationship between data producers and data users. Last week, the government announced a Rs.4,371 crore package to bolster the statistical system over the next five years.

The package is welcome. However, it is not enough to convince data users that the recent reforms momentum would sustain. As always, the devil lies in the details. There are three key questions facing the statistics ministry on the reform agenda.

The first question relates to the economic census, an inventory of non-farm ente...