The Tribune

By EARYEL BOWLEG

Tribune Staff Reporter

ebowleg@tribunemedia.net

THE Census of Population and Housing will take place starting January 2022 and people will have the option to complete the questionnaire online, via telephone or in person.

Chief Census Officer Kim Saunders said yesterday the digital format will not only transform how data is managed and analysed, but also change the way data is collected.

“Census workers will do all data collection using digital devices, which means all census data, no matter which collection method is used, will be directly uploaded, validated and processed in real-time by a robust software solution that was pioneered and co-financed by the World Bank,” she said.

“For the online census, there will be a questionnaire that individuals can complete from the comfort of their homes, anytime of the day, and at their leisure. Via telephone, census enumerators will administer the questionnaire over the phone. Finally, traditional in-person interviews will also be conducted.”

But in order to choose, individuals must first take part in the pre-census listing exercise going on now until the end of November. Census listers are currently in the field conducting a pre-census listing exercise to create a National Register of Households and to collect household contact information.

Listers will ask three to five short questions and will have brief talks about obtaining individuals’ household contacts. Assistant Director Clara Lowe added that people will not have to come outside to answer questions and can give information through home windows.

“If we miss [you], you will see a callback letter from us on your door. This callback letter is very important because it will contain information that is needed to give the operators when you call in. There will be a number on the callback letter for you to call the Census Callback Centre, and when you call they will ask to give information that is on that callback letter.”

The callback letter will have a unique interview key and identification number that you will need to take part in the census.

If people miss the census listers, and if they also refuse to return a call, then next year at a specified time following the month of January, census enumerators will visit their homes in the traditional way in an effort to conduct an in person interview.

According to Ms Saunders, pre-listing on the outer islands is scheduled to begin officially in September.

She added: “The listing, we may encounter a few challenges which we are working out in terms of internet connection, but for the most part from our previous surveys we’ve had good internet connectivity from our islands, even those southeastern islands.

“Now we’ll have to use different strategies for different pockets of our population,” she said.

Ms Lowe spoke about options for those who have difficulties with technology.

“For those who may find it a challenge, we are offering what we call, your computer assisted telephone interviews, and we have now a Census Call Centre step up and we’re about to launch it during the listing so we can get used to how it will operate so that it be fully operational during the census and you will have a very friendly operator sitting there waiting for you to call in.

“You can just give them your unique identification code. They will pull up your questionnaire. They will ask you a few questions to make sure they have the right dwelling and then they will enter the information with you,” she said.

Asked for a timeline for the census, the chief census officer replied: “We are planning for the numeration process to be at least three months (Jan-Mar 2022). We will probably need a few weeks in April for clean up, but following the month of April we have given ourselves three-six months maximum for the preliminary of the census to be released.

“From the 2010 Census, we had a count of about 110,000 households I think approximately. What we have done in preparation for 2022, we did an increase of about 10 percent. So we’re looking at about at least 119,000 households,” Ms Saunders said when probed about a baseline on how many households are trying to be reached in the census.

The census includes all residents of The Bahamas. Officials say a person who has spent six months or more in the country or who intends to spend six months or more can take part and officials are not concerned about nationality, age, or any other status.

The budget for the census is about $6 million.