by Daniel Ooko

    NAIROBI, March 11 (Xinhua) -- The Kenyan government said on Wednesday it has adopted the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)'s new system of early warning on food security.

    The CountrySTAT is a national statistical information system for food and agriculture that harmonizes and integrates data on food and agriculture coming from different sources.

    The CountrySTAT national coordinator, Abner Ingosi said the objectives and goals of the new system - in conjunction with FAOSTAT -- aims to bring about accelerated reduction in hunger and poverty through more productive and sustainable agriculture.

    Ingosi who is also the deputy director at the Ministry of Agriculture said through core data base, policy makers and researchers can group data across thematic areas, such as production, trade and consumption in order to study relationships.

    Ingosi said that the system also organizes complex data in seconds, adding that it is an Internet based system that has already been tested and refined by many advanced countries.

    "The system also builds an effective program for handling interconnected statistical information and visual indicators on food and agriculture at sub-national, national, and international levels in line with World Food Summit and Millennium Development Goals, especially in the context of reducing extreme poverty and hunger," he said.

    He pointed out that it also organizes complex data in seconds; it is an internet-based system and has already been tested and refined by many advanced countries.

    CountrySTAT beneficiaries include users of food and agricultural statistics, who will have easy access to standardized and quality statistics. Producers of food and agricultural statistics can harmonize and smoothly publish their national and sub-national statistics.

    Other countries in the sub-Saharan Africa which have embraced the new system of data management include Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Nigeria, Uganda and Zambia.