spillover ; and ( d ) communication of official statistics. the latest phase aims to address data gaps related to ( i ) climate change ; ( ii ) household distributional information ; ( iii ) fintech and financial inclusion ; and ( iv ) scaling up access to private and administrative data and improve data sharing. 14. the proliferation of internet has led to an explosion in the availability and demand for data. businesses are making large investments to predict the behaviour of consumers by exploiting the advances made in the field of data analytics. amidst this inundation of data and inferences, it is important that peculiarities and nonconformities are subjected to robust statistical analysis and peer review before deriving conclusions. 15. in other words, statistics should focus on laying down the pathway towards proper interpretation in the present world of data abundance. this would facilitate more informed decision making, clarity in communication from decision makers and formation of rational expectations from market participants. 16. in most countries today including our own, there are greater demands from the profession of statistics for policy inputs and decision making. such rising demands on the profession necessitate robust quality of statistics and statistical methods. i would encourage the statisticians in the reserve bank of india, as well as those outside the bank, to make full use of the opportunities available by way of advances in statistical methods. we are living in an era where computing power practically has no boundaries. this is an opportunity as well as a challenge for statisticians across the world. 17. i earnestly hope that today ’ s deliberations will inspire our officers, especially the younger officers, to ask pertinent questions and rise to the challenges of the post - pandemic world. their endeavour should be to innovate solutions keeping in mind the mahalanobis dictum 7 : “ statistics must have a clearly defined purpose, one aspect of which is scientific advance and the other, human welfare and national development. ” 18. my best wishes for productive deliberations in today ’ s conference. thank you. rao, c. radhakrishna ( 1993 ). “ statistics must have a purpose : the mahalanobis dictum. ” sankhya : the indian journal of statistics, series a ( 1961 - 2002 ), vol. 55, no. 3, pp. 331 – 49.

they move independently. if the risks are correlated, then, in the aggregate, risks could rise above the risk appetite of management and the board, and they may have to consider changes in the business plan. for example, a decline in interest rates may increase interest - rate risk if it causes fixed - rate loans to be prepaid unexpectedly. additionally, the interest rate drop may stimulate a surge in new loan originations and that could cause lending staff to make errors as it copes with the increased workload. on the other hand, breakdowns in loan underwriting standards due to the retirement of an experienced loan manager who is replaced by an unproven lender can occur throughout the interest rate cycle. i have purposely chosen to describe erm activities that are part of other processes. i think this is the practical way for smaller organizations to implement erm. small organizations cannot afford to have dedicated staff and quantitative models of all forms of risk. by adding steps to existing management practices, management can lower implementation costs, but more importantly can increase attention on risk management by staff throughout the organization. that is, whether someone is designing a new branch office, shipping tapes to a backup site for storage, developing the layout for a newspaper ad, or training new employees, they will consciously think about risk as one of the elements of that business activity. increased risk awareness by staff throughout the enterprise is integral to managing risk successfully. having made some general points, i would now like to turn to the topic of mortgage lending to highlight the importance of erm. while details of these recent observations pertain to mortgage lending, they can also be applied to risk management in general. risk management in mortgage lending effectively managing the risk associated with mortgage lending involves much more than prudent underwriting. experienced risk managers understand the need to carefully consider the risks should the housing market slow, interest rates change, or unemployment rise. these include the risks that borrowers will not have sufficient income in the future to manage substantial payment increases and that continued home price appreciation may not provide a sufficient equity cushion to minimize losses in foreclosure. in addition, an accumulation of portfolio concentrations could leave an institution exposed in a downturn. lenders specializing in subprime loans, for example, have endured a string of bad news recently, including increasing loan delinquency and foreclosure rates and the shutdown of some lenders that could not operate profitably in a slower origination environment. in a broader sense,