Government Publications: International Statistics

This guide is intended to help researchers find statistical information and lists key international statistics.

The UBC Library catalogue has many resources to help you to understand and work with statistics. Here are a few sample titles:

Data and statistics are often used interchangeably but there is an important distinction between the two terms.  Data is the raw information from which statistics are created. Or put another way,  statistics provide an interpretation and summary of data and are ususally viewed in charts, graphs or tables. 

Statistics: 

• Numeric facts and figures
• derived from data (i.e. already processed)
• needs definitions & classifications (i.e. North American Industrial Classification System, National Occupational Classification etc.)
• presentation-ready
• published

Source: US Statistical Abstract

 Data or datasets are collections of numeric data that can be analyzed using specialized software such as Stata, SPSS, or R. Ofen referred to as "raw data".

Data are: 

• numeric files created and organized for analysis or porcessing
• require processing 
• needs detailed documentation 
• not display ready
• disseminated, not published

Source: Country and City Data Book, ICPSR

If you need data, you will need to go to Abacus - the Research Data Collection of the British Columbia Research Libraries' Data Services. 

You will need to login using your CWL.