Statistics South Africa counts South Africa

Advice and events

Statistics South Africa (Stats SA)  has put in place measures that will ensure that every person who finds himself or herself in South Africa between 10 and 31 October is counted. This will avoid missing some people in large numbers as was the case during past censuses.

Stats SA Head Pali Lehohla says a group of more than 120 000 enumerators (or field workers as they are also called) would cross the length and breadth of South Africa from 9 to 31 October to count people in different institutions, residential homes, ports of entry such as harbours, land border posts and airports.

Lehohla said between 1 and 14 November, about 30 000 Census 2011 supervisors would conduct follow-up operations to ensure that no one would be missed by field workers during the census period.

“We are trying to bring down the number of people that we miss during counting,” said Lehohla. He said the Censuses of 1996 and 2001 had shown that Stats SA had to make preparations as early as possible to make sure that it reached everybody.

For next month’s Census, Stats SA has come up with three plans to make sure that it becomes successful. The first plan involves starting early with preparations such as the training of fieldwork coordinators, fieldwork supervisors and the fieldworkers who do the actual enumerating on the ground.

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The second plan involves putting in extra measures such as the follow-up operations by the 30 000 supervisors.

The third plan will be a massive communication and publicity campaign after the Census.

“We believe with this three-point plan we will achieve what we set to do,” Lehohla said.

Between 1 and 8 October, a massive “Know Your Enumerator Campaign” will be conducted whereby communities would have an opportunity to know the fieldworker who will be counting them in their immediate environment.