Last week, Statistics SA released consolidated data on the financial statistics of higher education institutions for the 2006 financial year. Financial data is an often-neglected area of statistical analysis, overshadowed as it is by economic, social and demographic information.
However, as the release of this data demonstrates, financial information can provide valuable insights into the issues of the day. It is an important source for the monitoring of change.
The financial statistics released last week include comparative figures for the previous financial year (2005).
While these comparisons provide an indication of general trends, financial data for the two years are not comparable in all respects. The financial statements of higher education institutions are compiled on an accrual basis of accounting.
For the purpose of consolidating the data with the other components of general government, the data is converted from an accrual basis to a cash basis of accounting.
This creates certain limitations on the comparability of 2005 and 2006 data. In addition, mergers between institutions have changed the composition of the institutions that are compared, meaning that comparison of financial data between 2005 and 2006 must be undertaken with caution.
In November 2003 the cabinet approved plans for the restructuring of higher education through mergers and incorporations. Most mergers took place during 2005, but the restructuring process is ongoing, and will eventually result in 21 higher education institutions, rather than the 23 that formed the basis of financial data released for 2006.
The University of the North and the Medical University of South Africa merged to form the University of Limpopo.
Cape Technikon and Peninsula Technikon merged to form the Cape Peninsula University of Technology.
For the financial year to last December, data came from 16 universities, six universities of technology and one technikon. Of the universities, four are based in Gauteng, three in the Eastern Cape, three in the Western Cape, two in Limpopo, two in KwaZulu-Natal and one each in North West and Free State.
There are two universities of technology in Gauteng and one each in the Western Cape, Free State, KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape. The single remaining technikon is based in KwaZulu-Natal.
In terms of operational expenditure by higher education institutions, the largest contributor for the 2006 financial year involved the compensation of employees (R12.524 billion), followed by the purchases of goods and services (R7.865 billion), other payments (R770 million), and interest paid (R157 million).
In the two financial years under review, total revenue to these institutions rose from R24.499 billion in 2005 to R26.925 billion in 2006. State grants rose from R10.333 billion in 2005 to R11.021 billion in 2006.
However, data supplied do not map these increases in grants to fluctuations in total student numbers, nor are they adjusted for inflation. These factors would have to be taken into account in estimating the real change in grants between 2005 and 2006.
Next week Stats SA releases the first results of its important community survey, the largest sample survey undertaken in South Africa, designed to provide data nationally, provincially and for each of the country's 264 municipalities.
Information from this survey is eagerly awaited, as it will provide the most comprehensive picture of social progress since the results of the 2001 population census were released. However, as I pointed out yesterday to parliament's finance portfolio committee, no "sneak previews" of the data are available, not even to those MPs who exercise oversight of Stats SA.
They will have to wait until next Wednesday, when data from the community survey is made available, on an equal and impartial basis, to executives, legislators, policy makers and commentators, and the millions of ordinary South Africans whose lives are most affected by developments monitored and measured by this survey.
Pali Lehohla is South Africa's statistician-general and the head of Stats SA. For more information on Stats SA and its statistical outputs, including the financial statistics of higher education institutions for 2006, visit www.statssa.gov.