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Organization and roles of regional offices

The roles of the regional offices are as follows:

  • gathering local data through surveys or through the use of local administrative data;
  • conducting statistical analyses and studies on demographics and the economy, at regional or local level: there may be, for example, overviews of the economy or demography, but further analysis may be needed in the case of a specific local policy, such as long-term State-region contracts or town planning projects;
  • the dissemination of statistical information to all types of user.

Three roles

Production of statistics in the region

The production of statistics by the regional offices is essentially national production, i.e. determined by Insee Head Office, but also includes the production of local statistics.

A certain number of operations are carried out by every regional office, for example the population census.

Other operations are conducted only by some of the regional offices, who then cover a greater territory than just their region. This is the case, for example, for "civil status" (grouped into 8 regional sites), "retail prices" (7 regional sites) and the Sirene register (10 regional sites).

A regional office can conduct local surveys, on households or companies, or extend to national surveys (increasing the sample to have better regional or local representation), or use administrative files that are available locally to analyse certain areas more closely. These operations are often carried out in partnerships and use external funding.

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Studies and dissemination in the region

In the case of studies, the regional offices contribute to a twofold rationale of supply and demand. First, they must assess the data that is available in their region and make it generally accessible to the public, then they must respond to the needs of public actors throughout the region.

The products they disseminate may be publications, studies or electronic products, but they may also be customised data analysis. More and more often this information is disseminated online via the internet. The regional offices disseminate their products, in accordance with a common framework, on the regional pages of the insee.fr website.

While each regional office has a certain degree of autonomy in relation to regional action, they all coordinate their work in order to take advantage of investments made elsewhere. This network is run by the regional action department at Head Office. Insee's services are offered to regional actors on the basis of a "coherent offer for the regions" offering standard products complemented by further studies. The "local authorities" portal describes the regional products that Insee offers.

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Relations with local authorities

The ways in which statistics are produced does not fall under the remit of the Prefect, unlike the content and the organization of education or tax assessment and collection. The Insee regional office, which is part of the "Public management and economic development" cluster led by the head of the regional public finance office, meets the demands of State departments in providing statistical data and studies.

The local authorities (region, department, commune) and other public actors in the region are in the position of requesters of statistical information and also, if necessary, act as a partner.

All local authorities are able to take advantage of Insee's service offering, in the same way as State administrative departments, for example. When there are partnerships, these may involve conducting surveys, joint studies or publications.

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One regional office, three departments

Each Insee regional office includes three departments:

  • a statistics department (SES);
  • a studies and dissemination department (SED);
  • a resource administration department (SAR).

Further information

Links

The "local authorities" portal describes the regional products that Insee offers