By Ola Awad

As Mahmoud Jaradat prepares to retire next year from the post of assistant of president for Statistical Affairs at the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS), a number of us–including me–have mixed emotions about his pending departure. Mr. Jaradat has contributed greatly to put in place the very foundations that have made PCBS such a success.

His name is printed in almost every statistical publication that PCBS has produced. Mr. Jaradat has played a vital role in accomplishing the first-ever Population, Housing and Establishment Censuses in 1997 and 2007, in addition to the first-ever agriculture census in 2010.