9.1 Introduction

Statistics is the collection, organisation, analysis and interpretation of information, for the purpose of describing a situation and making decisions about it.

There are two broad divisions.

(a).

Descriptive statistics deals with presenting data in tables and graphs, and with summarising it into a few numbers that capture its shape.

(b).

Inferential statistics uses a sample to draw conclusions about the whole population it came from.

This chapter is concerned with the first of these. Organisations that rely on it daily include the Zambia Statistics Agency, the Road Transport and Safety Agency, the Zambia Revenue Authority, hospitals, banks and insurance companies.

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