Isaac Kerstenetzky - Biblioteca - IBGE

Isaac Kerstenetzky, fomentador das estatísticas brasileiras:
perfi l do cientista e do humanista
Professor Isaac Kerstenetzky (1926-1991)
Estudioso da teoria econômica, o professor Isaac teve o exato entendimento da importância
da abordagem sistêmica das estatísticas econômicas. Compreendeu o papel relevante
das contas nacionais não só como instrumento substantivo a serviço da análise econômica,
mas, sobretudo, na coordenação das estatísticas, como marco conceitual.
Responsável pelo Sistema Estatístico do Brasil, teve a necessária antevisão da importância
de tal instrumento, para dar início, em sua gestão no IBGE (1970-19792 ), ao projeto de
elaboração das Contas Nacionais, na concepção mais ampla, integrando as matrizes de
insumo-produto. Criou um grupo de estudos, ligado diretamente à presidência e composto
por jovens economistas, para estudar a teoria e a metodologia de construção de
matrizes. Este mesmo grupo, mais tarde, formaria a equipe do então recém-criado Departamento
de Contas Nacionais, que assumiu, no IBGE, o projeto de elaboração do Sistema
de Contas Nacionais, completo e moderno.
Esta publicação é, portanto, fruto da visão do professor Isaac Kerstenetzky sobre o Sistema
das Estatísticas Econômicas.
A ele, nosso reconhecimento.
***
Ao seu falecimento, a Revista Brasileira de Economia (v. 45, n. 3, p. 333-383, jul./set.
1991), da Fundação Getúlio Vargas, rendeu-lhe marcante homenagem publicando três
artigos de saudades – de Werner Baer, de Mário Henrique Simonsen, de Anníbal Villela
– dos quais extraímos alguns trechos, como segue:
Isaac Kerstenetzky: social scientist, por Werner Baer (p. 335-336)
Ever since I knew Isaac, he was interested in quays in which statistical information could ultimately
help the policy-maker in planning the allocation of resources so as to maximize economic growth,
subject to the constraints of an adequate concern for equity. It was fortunate for the country
that he became president of IBGE, which enabled him to infl uence the development of new statistical
information necessary for the country’s policy-makers who where faced with an increasingly
complex economy. Among his most important contributions at IBGE was the organization and
the administration of the 1970 census, which was a vast improvement over the preciously, semiaborted
1960 census; the huge consumer budget study (ENDEF), which enormously increased the
frontier of social-economics analysis in Brazil; the PNAD surveys, providing periodic information
on a whole host of social-economic information; the expansion of the economic censuses in order
to produce an input-output table which was usable for updating the national accounts system and
for making more adequate sectorial impact studies; the computerization of the IBGE system, which
made it possible to rapidly process the myriad of data being generated by the newly instituted
information system, and he laid the groundwork for the transfer of national accounts from de the
Fundação Getulio Vargas to IBGE. In other words, under Isaac’s leadership, Brazil’s statistical
information system made gigantic strides forward.
Also of importance during Isaac’s tenure of the IBGE presidency was the a itude he tried to instill
in the producers of information. He made an eff ort to have the consumers of data produced by
the IBGE system make their needs known to him and his staff . This would help the la er develop
a system of information which would be of maximum use to the nation. Although Isaac made
giant contributions to the country’s informational system and was fascinated by techniques which
could make the information generated useful to the economic planner, he was not a rigid believer
in a planned economy. He felt that a vast system of social-economic information, combined with
appropriate quantitative techniques, could serve policy-makers in systems with diff erent mixes of
private and public enterprises. It could be used for systems where the State’s direct participation in
the economy was relatively small and where planning would be of an indicative type, or in systems
where the participation of the state was relatively strong.
2 Na obra este período está registrado erradamente, qual seja, 1971-1979. Fizemos a correção na transcrição.
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