National Census from Feb 27 to March 21:

Stand up and be counted

By Ranil WIJAYAPALA

For any country or nation a population census is a very important event. It was considered a vital date for everybody as it is the occasion where all the individuals are counted by the state officials.

Sri Lanka which has not undergone a complete census in 30 years is ready to undergo this process at least in 2012 but with a different approach with Census and Statistics Department fixing dates for the enumeration stage sans a census night to complete the 2011 census in March 2012.

The Census and Statistics Department has finally fixed the dates for the enumeration stage of the 2011 census from February 27 to March 21 to give a correct idea of the population and housing in Sri Lanka in its post conflict scenario.

According to Director Census, of the Census and Statistics Department, A.H.R. Gunasekara, although the third stage of the 2011 was scheduled to be held last year, due to some delays in printing the scheduled questionnaire used for the census it had to be postponed to 2012.

"Now we have fixed the dates and it will be conducted from February 27 to March 21", he added.

A.H.R. Gunasekara

Census are generally conducted in three stages and the first two stages of the 2011 census were conducted in 2010 and 2011 respectively.

First stage

The first stage is allocated for the preparation of maps for the census. In that stage the Census officials identify census blocks within each Grama Niladari Division. "These are the smallest enumeration areas which consist of 150 building units and we have demarcated them as census blocks. This part of the census was conducted in 2010", Gunasekara said.

At the second stage listing of building units were done based on the maps prepared by the census officials. " We listed all the building units in the enumeration areas and fixed a label and then enter information into support form by providing house holders name and their basic information. That is the basic frame for the enumeration stage. So that stage was completed in April and May last year", he added.

"The third stage of the census, the enumeration stage was scheduled to be held in 2011 but due to some delays in printing, the scheduled questionnaire used for the census we had to delay it a little. Now we have fixed the dates. It will be conducted from February 27 to March 21", he added.

The enumeration stage will also be conducted in various stages and a huge number of enumerators, census officers, government officials in the administration sector will be involved in this process.

" We are conducting the census according to the Census Ordinance and according to it, District Secretaries are the Commissioners of Census in that particular district and Divisional Secretaries are the Deputy Commissioners of Census. The Assistant Divisional Secretaries are the Assistant Commissioners of Census", he added.

"We are making use of the administrative structure at District level in conducting the census and assigned the responsibilities to them to carry out the census", he added.

In addition the branch offices of the Census and Statistics Department at district level headed by Deputy Director or Senior Statistician are providing the technical assistance to conduct the census for Divisional Secretaries and other administrative officials.

"Our staff is basically the technical advisors who are providing the technical guidelines for those who are participating in the census", he added.

Enumeration stage

Apart from the Government officials, approximately 80,000 enumerators have been recruited to conduct the enumeration stage of the census from February 27 to March 22.

"Enumerators are the people who are going from house to house and collecting information from the residents. They all will not be government servants and there may be outsiders also. They all have been selected by the Divisional Secretaries", he added.

Apart from the enumerators 16,000 supervisors have also been appointed to supervise enumerators.

"Most of the supervisors are Grama Niladaris. We have 14,000 Grama Niladaris but there are some areas Grama Niladaris are not available and their positions are vacant. For those areas we have asked the Divisional Secretaries to appoint some other responsible government officers to act as supervisors", Gunasekara added..

The Census and Statistics Department will be training all the enumerators to prepare themselves for the enumeration stages at countrywide workshops.

"We are training all the supervisors from January 12 to 18. We are starting the training enumerators from January 19 and will be continued till February 17. Therefore we will have more than 2,500 training classes for the enumerators throughout the island. These will be conducted by the Census Department officers at district level", he added.

Further explaining the qualifications of the enumerators who have been recruited for this purpose, Gunasekara said the Department has instructed the Divisional Secretaries to recruit Advance Level qualified persons below 45 years of age for this purpose.

"We have not selected people at random. We have asked the Divisional Secretaries to conduct interviews to select them. They should satisfy certain criteria and their handwriting should also be tested as we are going to scan the documents. Therefore we need good handwriting", he added.

In areas where they do not get Advance level qualified people, they have been asked to at least get Ordinary Level qualified people as enumerators.

The enumeration stage will also be conducted in two stages, that is data collection stage and revision round.

The three weeks from February 27 to March 19 will be the data collection stage. During the data collection period enumerators will visit each and every household and living quarter and collect information from the individuals residing in the unit.

" We are asking 29 questions from persons and 17 details on the household level", he added.

The informations that are to be asked at the enumeration stage from individuals are listed under demographic information, migration information, physical and mental difficulties, education information, economic activities and the fertility information. Basically we are collecting information on persons as well as on buildings.

Under demographic information the name, sex, marital status, ethnic group, national identity card number, date of birth , religion and the citizenship will be recorded from each person.

Migration information

Under migration information, the district of birth, duration of residence in this district, district or previous residence, reason for migrating to this district will recorded from each individual.

The physical and mental difficulties of persons will also be recorded at the census.

Under education information, highest educational achievement, highest professional or vocational qualification, and speaking, reading , writing ability of the individuals will be recorded.

Activities engaged in the past 12 months, main occupation and industry, employed status and service, main non-economic activity in the past 12 months will be recorded from each individual under economic activities.

Fertility information of the females will also be recorded.

Information on housing will include, number of usual residents in the household, principal source of drinking water, principal source of cooking fuel, principal type lighting, toilet facilities / type of toilet, principal method of solid waste disposal, tenure, existing communication equipment , ability to access internet.

Under housing information number of households in the unit, number of usual residents in the unit, principal material of construction of the housing unit, wall, roof floor, type of structure, unit usage and number of rooms will be recorded.

"We are asking the people to provide correct information to the enumerators when they arrive at their houses at this enumeration stage", Gunasekara added.

The revision round of the enumeration will be from March 20 and 21.

"In the revision round we review the data collected from February 27 to March 19 because there may be deaths and new births during that period. We are deleting the records of the dead persons during the revision round and the new births will be included", he said.

Apart from that the changes of residences will also be counted during this revision period to make the data collected more accurate.

"We are asking these questions from the usual residence as we are conducting this census based on the usual residence methodology but not based on the de-facto methodology of counting people as they found that was adopted in the previous census", Gunasekera added.

Basically, if a person is living somewhere for more than six months, his usual place of residence is that place.

"If he is having two or more residences we select the place where he mostly reside. For example if a person's home town is Galle and he works in Colombo and used to visit home town once or twice his usual place of residence is Colombo. But it will differ from his permanent residence. That is the methodology used in many other countries as well", Gunasekera added.

In addition to this, enumerators will also ask information about some other people who have gone abroad for temporary reasons for more than six months.

They are no longer a usual residence in Sri Lanka. Suppose they have gone for middle East for two years we are asking information, their name age, sex, the country and the purpose whether it is for work, education or other purpose.

"Apart from collecting data from the usual residence we are also collecting data from those who are not having homes to live. We are counting them on the night of March 19. We already asked the District officers to identify the places they can find the people living in streets and appoint enumerators to collect data from them. They have already identified them and they will counted on March 19 night", he added.

At the 2001 census, in one night all the people were counted. At the initial stage basic information were taken but on the census night all were checked for the physical presence, that is because the last time the methodology was not based on the usual residence, and the persons were counted from the places where they were found on the census night.

"This time there is no such census night as we go by the usual residents", Gunasekara added.

According to Director Gunasekara although Sri Lanka used the de-facto method in earleir census that method is not so suitable for developing country for planning purposes.

" In planning purposes they should give things for the people living in the area whether it is transport, electricity . For the need assessment we need the usual residence approach. For the district administration purposes also they need the usual resident people. There was request from the district level also for this", he added.

The second change in the 2011 census compared to the previous census is the electronic capture of the documents.

"Last time we conducted it manually and data were entered through the keyboards and it took over two years to enter the data collected from the census. This time we want to expedite the matter and therefore we are scanning the documents. It is not just scanning, the software we use can take the data in that document into the data base. That is very fast", Gunasekera added.

Apart from this, the Census and Statistics Department is also planning to conduct electronic census in limited areas in the Colombo Municipal Council area where large apartments are located.

"This time we are conducting it in a very small scale and about few hundred houses we selected from apartment complexes in Colombo and suburbs. We have visited them and got their consent. We will give them a password into the system we have developed and they can log on to the system and fill their forms online. That is on a testing basis. May be on the next round of census we may further developed it", Gunasekara added.

In many developed countries like Japan, Singapore, they are using this e census.

According to Gunasekara the national ID number, reason for migration, professional and vocational qualification, computer literacy are new additions in the 2011 census.

"We are also asking the physical and mental disability like in the previous census, but the approach will be different this time", he added.

He said the entire census is funded by the Sri Lankan Government and the total cost of the census is around 1700 million. " We also got assistance from UNFPA, UNDP and UNICEF by means of equipment and training the staff", he added.

According to Gunasekara through the Census Ordinance, citizens of this country are bound to provide correct and accurate information to enumerators. At the same time enumerators are also bound not to divulge any individual information to anybody.

"They should give the correct information. That is from the part of respondents. On the part of the census officials also they should not divulge census information to anybody. If they divulged they are subjected to certain punishments. At the same time, if somebody hides information or give incorrect information there are provisions in the Ordinance to fine them or imprison them. But we try to educate the people rather than going for legal action", Gunasekara added.

Census Ordinance

Amendments were brought to the Census Ordinance to increase the fine on those who are proved guilty of providing incorrect information to enumerators. "If anybody breaches the Census Ordinance they can be produced before Courts and be prosecuted. If somebody refuses to give information or deliberately gives false information and if he is found guilty, he or she can be imprisoned for six months and can be fined. The fine has been increased to Rs. 50,000," he added.

"We are asking the support of the general public since they are the ultimate beneficiaries of this census. We are asking them not to be counted in two places and they have to be counted only in one place. Everybody should be included in the census. Nobody should be missed out or nobody should be duplicated", he added..