Press release No. 532 of 15 December 2022
WIESBADEN – The Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) will get a new head of office on 1 January 2023: the Federal President today appointed Dr. Ruth Brand as successor to Dr. Georg Thiel, the current President of the Federal Statistical Office, who will retire at the end of 2022. Dr. Brand, who holds a doctorate in economics, previously worked at the Federal Statistical Office from 2001 to 2020, lastly as Head of the Department "Health, Social Statistics, Education and Households". Since April 2020, she has been Head of the Procurement Agency of the Federal Ministry of the Interior (BMI). Now, Ruth Brand will return to the Federal Statistical Office as the second female president in its almost 75-year history. On 1 January 2023, Ruth Brand will also succeed Georg Thiel as Federal Returning Officer.
The Federal Statistical Office's work is indispensable for the development of informed opinions in the political and scientific communities as well as in society
Georg Thiel, the outgoing President, was first appointed Vice-President of the Office and Deputy Federal Returning Officer in October 2015 and then became President of the Federal Statistical Office and Federal Returning Officer in November 2017.
His tenure as President and Federal Returning Officer was marked by the 2019 European election and the 2021 Bundestag election as well as by a clear focus on the digital transformation of statistics. As a result, the Federal Statistical Office was able to meet the need for highly up-to-date data as a basis for fact-based decision-making and crisis management during the Covid-19 pandemic, for example through new highly up-to-date indicators and by accelerating the release of economic and health statistics. New user-oriented data such as those offered on the Dashboard Germany portal (only in german), which combines data from official statistics and other data providers, provide a sound overview of the current situation in the economy and finance as well as in health and mobility at any time. In addition, Thiel initiated a Newsroom which, together with specialised statisticians, provides data on current political and social issues from just under 400 sets of statistics every day.
Thiel considers the Federal Statistical Office to be well positioned for the future and for the increasing requirements in the data market. "It is especially in times of crisis that the importance of up-to-date, high-quality statistical information for fact-based decision-making in a democracy comes to the fore. The system of official statistics needs to develop further in this environment and to prove its worth not only as a statistics producer but also as a digital information provider. To meet current data needs, we have to explore new data sources and to link them with our data competence in the individual subject areas. We have succeeded in doing so in the last years."
Ruth Brand knows the Federal Statistical Office well after nearly 20 years of working there
Ruth Brand will be the second female president of the Federal Statistical Office, after Hildegard Bartels who headed the Office from 1972 to 1980. She will be the twelfth president in the almost 75-year history of the Federal Statistical Office, which has a workforce of just over 2,400 staff distributed between offices in Wiesbaden, Bonn and Berlin.
Brand started her professional career at Hanover University, before she became a member of the academic staff at the then Federal Institute for Employment in Nuremberg. In 2001, she moved to the Federal Statistical Office in Wiesbaden, where she first worked in the field of de facto anonymisation of statistical microdata. Afterwards, she worked in agricultural statistics at the Bonn Branch Office for many years, before she was appointed Head of the Department "Health, Social Statistics, Education and Households", with units in both Wiesbaden and Bonn. In this function, one of her main priorities was to increase the standardisation of statistics production and to modernise statistics.
In a first statement, Ruth Brand said: "I am looking forward to my new position, and I am grateful for the trust placed in me. As President, I want to promote the Federal Statistical Office's development to become an attractive service provider for the various groups of users, because enormous challenges lie ahead. We are in the midst of a profound social and economic transformation. In the business and political communities as well as in the general public, there is continuous demand for easily accessible, high-quality data to ensure fact-based political decisions and to support a knowledge-based democracy. The success of our work depends on the competence of the Office's staff and their motivation to take an active part in shaping the necessary transformation processes. I know from own experience that I can rely on a very competent team at the Federal Statistical Office and I am looking forward to shaping the further development of official statistics together with the staff members as well as with German and international statistical partners. I would like to thank Dr. Georg Thiel for what he has achieved in restructuring the Office and for his services to official statistics in Germany."
The new President of the Federal Statistical Office will also become Federal Returning Officer
Besides her role as President of the Federal Statistical Office, Ruth Brand will also assume the position of Federal Returning Officer. The presidents of the Federal Statistical Office have held this position since 1953. As Federal Returning Officer, Ruth Brand will be responsible for the proper organisation and conduct of elections to the European Parliament and the German Bundestag, and she will chair the Constituency Commission.
