NIA CHARLESTOWN NEVIS (October 14, 2020) — The Department of Statistics and Economic Planning in the Ministry of Finance on Nevis will embark on a Pre-census Mapping Exercise from Friday, October 16 to Friday, November 20, 2020, as part of activities leading to the conduct of the Population and Housing Census commencing in September 2021.

Mrs. Dorriel Phillip, Director of the department noted that it is important to find out the true number of households on Nevis to plan for the census next year.

“We have a whole year and there are different exercises and different things that need to be done before we get to the census. So one of the first things that we are going to do is the Pre-census Listing and Mapping Exercise…It seeks to collect data on the number of households and persons residing in the various communities on Nevis and it also provides an update of the housing stock.

“You would realise that when we started 2010/2011 census and the 2020/2021 census that a number of new houses would have been built. So we need to capture the new houses that have been built and we need to know how many persons are right now residing on Nevis so that we can plan for the 2021 actual census,” she said.

For the pre-census exercise, each parish has been sub-divided into Enumeration Districts (EDs) and in accordance with the guidelines issued by CARICOM (Caribbean Community), each district should not exceed 100 households.

“That’s one of the first things we are checking in that the EDs that we presently have do not exceed 100 households and for those that have exceeded 100 households, with the help of the [Department of Physical Planning] we will have to change the boundaries of the EDs.

“So for each household there will be five simple questions and that is: Who is the head of the household? The contact number for the head of the household?  The number of persons living in the household? How many persons living in the households are males and how many are females? And the address of the household,” Mrs. Phillip explained.

The Department of Statistics and Economic Planning Director urged the public to cooperate with the enumerators, and gave the assurance that all information received would be treated with confidentiality.

“I would just like to encourage the general public to work along with our enumerators when they come to your homes. It won’t take you more than two to three minutes to answer the five questions. They will be using tablets so once the information is in, it is private, it’s confidential and it would be kept in the strictest confidence.

“We will be using it to help us to go forward in planning Census 2021 because when it is census everybody should be counted; everybody matters. This is not a sample survey where we are just doing a part of the population but this is every person must be counted, and so we encourage all persons to please cooperate and help us to do the job we set out to do,” she said.

The enumerators conducting the survey will be identified by their name tags which will also bear the department’s logo.