The meetings reviewed the Programme of International Statistical Work for Latin America and the Caribbean, July 2003-June 2005, and agreed to lay the foundations for a more long-term plan of action, with the aim of building up the institutional and operational capacity of national statistical offices (NSOs); and national statistical systems, in addition to  strengthening the guiding role of the Statistical Conference of the Americas.The Chairperson of the Executive Committee of the Statistical Conference of the Americas presented a document (LC/L.2215); entitled Reflections on the Meeting of the Statistical Conference of the Americas of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. There ensued a round- table discussion during which  participants adopted the proposal to produce a guideline document to respond  to countries' needs. For that  purpose, they agreed to set up working groups composed of representatives of the countries and of multilateral agencies to work on the following topics: (i); legal and institutional aspects, including questions of financing and budgeting, as well as coordination of national statistical systems; (ii); development of statistical capacity with long-run targets in terms of production, quality and dissemination of statistics, using a step-by-step approach to achieve those targets; (iii); training and human resources management policies; (iv); modernization of the management processes of national institutes of statistics, in order to make the best possible use of resources;  (v); relationships between producers and users of statistics in general; and (vi); strengthening international cooperation.To support such efforts, participants also agreed that, during the third meeting of the Conference (at  the  beginning  of  June  2005);,  member  countries  would  be  presented  with  three  documents  on substantive issues.  The National Institute of Statistics, Geography and Information (INEGI); of Mexico was tasked with preparing one such document, namely the present report on the development of national statistical systems and the responsibilities of national statistical offices.With a view to producing this document, INEGI designed and sent out the survey on statistical matters  in member countries of the Statistical Conference of the Americas, which was approved and enhanced by the members of the Executive Committee. The Chairperson of the Committee and ECLAC were directly involved in promoting the project, the results of which are outlined below.See Questionnaire