• Home
• /
• Entertainment

GENERAL CENSUS KICKS OFF TODAY

The general census operations of the UAE gets under way nationwide today, with more than 50 centres fully-equipped for the process. Speaking to Khaleej Times yesterday, Dr. Hafsa Abdullah Al-Ulamaa...

the Director-General of the Supreme Authority of 2005 census, said that the approximately 4,500 researchers, who have already been distributed across the country, would start working today.

Each researcher has a set number of families to count. The census will include the number of family members, marital status, number of computers with Internet access, number of Internet users, employment status and kind (governmental or private), citizenship, age and education level, she added.

There will not be any inquiries about documents like passports, ID cards, citizenship cards or labour cards. The primary aim of data gathering is to have accurate figures on the population, Dr. Hafsa confirmed.

To ensure accurate figures, the UAE Foreign Ministry has been asked to communicate to all embassies, consulates, diplomatic missions to draw their nationals’ attention to the census.

Census researchers will work from 4 pm to 9 pm. There will be 55 centres across the country to input the collected data and send it to the central computer in the Ministry of Economy and Planning, she informed.

A hot line (6123204) has been dedicated by the census authority for complaints, inquiries, and comments, in addition to the census web page, she said.

Complying with the Ministry of Health requirements, disabled people will be specially mentioned in the census in order to give them the appropriate services they need, she noted.

“2005 Census will have all the UAE local authorities participating in it. The Ministry of Interior, for example, has provided researchers with cars to transport them,” she pointed out.

Women's participation in the census is 10 per cent. The process of gathering data will continue till the end of this month, and they will be examined and scrutinised during January 2006, Hafsa said.