Iswadi Suhari Mawabagja has dedicated his life to the development of statistics, especially agricultural statistics, in Indonesia. He is the former Deputy Director of the Statistics Division for the Food and Agriculture Organization, United Nations (FAO UN). He co-led the division to play a fundamental role in providing data for global monitoring, developing methods and standards for food and agriculture statistics, and providing technical assistance services to strengthen the agriculture statistical systems of member countries and help them reduce hunger and poverty by making informed decisions through access to the best possible data.
Before joining FAO, Iswadi was the Deputy Director of Statistical Analysis at BPS Statistics, where he led the production of statistical indicators including national and regional levels of the Human Development Index. He led analyses of large national projects such as the Economic Census. His opinions were published in leading Indonesian newspapers, highlighting important national issues such as agriculture, food security, child labor, and child deprivation. He also wrote a book on writing opinion pieces for newspapers.
Iswadi has been pursuing his interest in the arts, especially creative writing for novels and plays. His novel “Cintaku Setengah Agama” (My Love is a Half of Religion) is based on the Islamic hadiths stating “When a person gets married, he has completed half of his religion.” While at university, he was also a radio broadcaster.
For the e-conference, Iswadi will be presenting:
Comedy play for stress reduction and work engagement – Statisticians are not that boring.
Generating statistical products can be very stressful and time-consuming, especially when we are talking about national or international indicators that could change the policy direction. The burden is both physical and psychological. Based on previous work, Iswadi will present his experience on appealing to the artistic side of scientists to help them better relax by carrying out their duties in creative and fun ways. His expertise and experience in creative writing and radio business produced a zero budget comedy play which demonstrated how work engagement and relationships among statisticians in his networks could be improved. To understand more, e-conference participants are encouraged to preview one of his plays here. (Turn on the caption feature to see the English subtitles).