Sir John Sinclair, 1st Baronet

Sir John Sinclair ( born May 10, 1754 † December 21, 1835 ) was a Scottish economist and politician. He was born in Thurso, Caithness, the eldest son of George Sinclair of Ulbster. After years of study at the Universities of Edinburgh and Glasgow, and at Trinity College ( Oxford), he was admitted as a lawyer, has never exercised this profession. Sinclair was appointed a baronet in 1780 and represented from 1780 to 1811, the county of Caithness in the House. He was co-founder and first president of the Board of Agriculture, the predecessor of today's Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF ).

Sir John was a member of the Royal Society of London and the Royal Society of Edinburgh. As in 1834, the Statistical Society of London (now the Royal Statistical Society) was founded, he was the oldest member at the age of 80 years. This 21 - volume work, Statistical Account of Scotland Sinclair was the first to use the term statistics in its present importance of collecting and evaluating data.