2021 Digital Population and Housing Census commences in May

The Ghana Statistical Service is set to conduct the 2021 Population and Housing Census (PHC) in May through digital signals within the period of three weeks after census night of 2^nd May, 2021.

This is provisional.

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The usage of the technology in 2021 was part of the recommendations by The United Nations (UN) to do away with the old age traditional method of paper questionnaires.

The enumeration will be done in about fifty two thousand (52,000) Enumeration Areas with about seventy thousand (70,000) Enumerators nationwide.

Speaking on the subject, ‘Census methodology and enumeration procedures’ at the 2021 Population and Housing Census training workshop for Journalists at Winneba, Head of Census Methodology, Owusu Kagya said, the Service has taken delivery of “a number of tablets (loaded with software, maps and reference materials) to be used for electronic data capture and geographic positioning” and “during enumeration the data will be monitored online in real time”.

According to him, the use of technology will help the elimination of manual data entry, real time data sent to the server from the time listing and enumeration starts and it will as well shorten the time taken to release census results/products.

GSS however assured the public of the security of the information they provide and personal data provided cannot be used for any other purpose aside from Statistical Purposes.

In all, over forty Journalists were selected from five regions, Greater Accra, Central, Western, Eastern and Volta Regions to constitute the Southern Zone of the media sensitization workshop after they have done with the Northern and the Middle Zones.

The topics treated were: background of the 2021 PHC, issues and concerns to consider, census methodology and enumeration procedures and resources available for Journalists

Background of the 2021 PHC

The conduct of the Ghana 2021 Population and Housing Census (PHC) will provide updated demographic, social and economic data to support national development activities and for tracking the implementation of global and continental development goals including the Sustainable Development Goals, International Conference on Population and Development goals, and Africa’s Agenda 2063.

The Ghana Statistical Service has highlighted the benefits of the data that will be collected on individuals, households and structures, during the listing and enumeration exercise.

Also, the resourcefulness of geo-spatial data for all the over 131,000 localities in Ghana that were collected during the Census Mapping exercise and will be updated during the field work for the main census have been catalogued.

The census will produce data on who we are, how many are we, as well as where and how we live.

The data is expected to be used by government, private sector, businesses, civil society organisations, development partners, special interest groups, academics, media, households and other stakeholders to conduct research and generate information for general use and to inform specific policies and their implementation.