The 60th World Statistics Congress of the International Statistical Institute will take place in Rio de Janeiro between July 26 and 31. Gathering the most respected experts of this scientific area, the event will discuss how a number of aspects of our environmental, social and economic reality will be measured along the 21st century.

Founded 130 years ago, ISI is the oldest and the most important statistical association in the world. For the first time, a Brazilian person will assume its presidency in 2015. After 60 years, the IBGE will host it again in Brazil.

1,600 registered persons 1,300 articles. 250 special or invited sessions Behind these numbers, the state of the art in terms of statistical studies produced by 130 countries.

Modeling, sampling, time series, big data and computing are among the subjects to be discussed. Statistical applications in the financial market, in sports and in studies on unemployment, demography and gender inequality remains in place, as well as interdisciplinarities with astronomy, biology, physics and medicine. Nevertheless, there are more and more statistical studies on the environment and on the 'green economy'.

The ISI congress will also discuss unprecedented quantitative approaches to subjects like corruption, human rights and tourism. In addition, ISI traditionally assesses a number of aspects of the international cooperation between the official statistical offices. ISI sessions will take place in Riocentro, located in the west region of Rio de Janeiro.

130 years of statistics and citizenship

Founded in 1885, the International Statistical Institute is the oldest and the most important association of statisticians in the world. Its mission is to promote understanding, development and good practices in all the areas of statistics. ISI has about four thousand members coming from 130 countries, from who more than two thousand are elected due to their scientific contributions.

Several members participated in the creation of the Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics, adopted by a number of national statistical offices - including the IBGE - and recently endorsed by the United Nations General Assembly. The biannual congresses of ISI have been taking place since 1887 (Rome), just briefly interrupted during the two world wars. Brazil was among the 11 countries represented in the first ISI congress.

ISI will be chaired by a Brazilian for the first time

In 2015, professor Pedro Luis do Nascimento Silva, full researcher of the National School of Statistical Sciences (ENCE/IBGE), was elected president of ISI. This is the first time that this responsibility is granted to a Brazilian, which shows the international recognition of the statistics produced in our country, as well as of the IBGE, which will host this world congress.

PhD in Statistics from the University of Southampton (1996), professor Pedro is considered the most important expert in sampling surveys in Brazil. At IBGE, Pedro has been performing an important role in the development of statistical methods for more than 30 years. He was a professor in the University of Southampton and consultant in the Office for National Statistics in the United Kingdom. He also chaired the International Association of Survey Statisticians and the Inter-American Statistical Institute. In 2014, he was elected fellow of the American Statistical Association, a titration annually granted and limited to less than 1% of the members of that association.

60 years ago, top names of Statistics visited Petrópolis

This is not the first time that the ISI congress takes place in Brazil. In 1955, Brazil hosted the 29th World Statistics Congress, which gathered the top names of this scientific field today associated with fundamental methods, equations and theorems. Exactly 60 year ago, the city of Petrópolis hosted more than a hundred of scientists coming from 40 countries, like British Ronald Fisher - founder of the modern statistics and who also highly contributed to genetics -, Indian Calyampudi Radhakrishna Rao - theorist of statistical inference and still active -, American Walter Willcox - non-parametric statistics and the test after his name - and Gertrude Cox - planning of statistical experiments -, French Émile Borel - introducer of the infinite monkey theorem and of the Borel–Cantelli lemma - and Italian Corrado Gini - creator of the famous index that measures income inequality.

The ministry of Foreign Relations, Raul Fernandes, opened the event. The Brazilian delegation was headed by Teixeira de Freitas - who devised the IBGE and organized the Brazilian statistics through the integration of the three government spheres - and also counted on Italian Giorgio Mortara - father of the Brazilian demography and who coordinated the first two population censuses of the IBGE. During the congress, the Quitandinha Hotel - one of the most luxurious at that time - housed an exhibition open to the public, including a number of panels on the economic and social reality of Brazil, as well as a collection of publications produced by official statistical offices of a number of countries.