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Census operations start

ABU DHABI - Teams charged with the task of conducting the 'General Census of Population, Housing and Establishments' comprising approximately 1,000 supervisors, began executing field work yesterday, enumerating and marking buildings within the designated areas and gathering all related data.

The work started with a meeting at the premises of the Ministry of Economy and Planning in Sharjah, held in the presence of Hafsa Abdullah Al Ulama, Assistant Under-Secretary for Planning and Director-General of Census 2005. The meeting was attended by census managers and supervisors, and discussed means of making the process smooth and successful.

Officials said supervisors were given instructions on how best to apply what they learnt at training sessions in the past few weeks.

The operations in the first phase involve enumeration of the components of buildings like apartments, offices or stores, besides supervising groups of researchers who would be gathering data from residents during the enumeration stage. Teams visited Census 2005 work sites, which include 29 schools all over the country. The teams at the Sharjah meeting yesterday visited Ras Al Khaimah and inspected the Census 2005 work sites housed in three schools - Al Joodah, Greater Tunb (Tunb Al Kubra) and Al Ramas.

Current phase of the census operation will continue till October 10. Rashid Abdul Rahman Al Nuaimi, Director of the Planning Department at the ministry, said state-of-the-art equipment was being used in the census operations. An advanced digital device, Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), is being used for the first time in a general census of the country. Over 2,000 enumerators, supervisors and other support staff have been thoroughly trained to use advanced technology to record census figures and other statistics.

The government had organised several training workshops for Census 2005 supervisors, to acquaint them with the procedures to be followed in conducting the census and enumeration as well as dealing with the residents and firms in Abu Dhabi, the Western and Eastern Regions.

Work teams involved in the 'UAE Census 2005' in the country demarcated areas in cities and large villages in preparation to carry out the census. Cities have been divided into sectors to facilitate the work of UAE Census 2005 teams.

Preliminary results of the census are expected to be announced in the first quarter of 2006.

Officials had said the government would be transparent in disclosing the results of the census.

The government conducted four censuses earlier - in 1975, 1980, 1985 and 1995. But this census will be different in many ways, according to officials. This time, there will be manifestation of the integration and coordination between the federal and local governments.

Officials said the use of satellite technology and PDAs in the census initiative is a step forward, and expressed confidence that these collaborative arrangements will help make the project a success.

In Al Ain, Humeid Ali Al Zaaby, the Census Director in Abu Dhabi Emirate, told Khaleej Times that there are 19 statistics centres in the emirate including 11 data gathering and training centres in Al Ain City to ensure accuracy in census figures. There are two centres in Abu Dhabi, three centres in it's surrounding areas of Al Shahamah, Bany Yas and Mussafah, and two centres in Al Rowais and Zayed City (Western Region). He said the 200 data collectors in Al Ain took eight days training in the use of Personal Digital Assistants.

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