2023 Census: NPC Assures Nigerians of Preparedness

 

The National Population Commission, NPC has given utmost assurance that the 2023 Population and Housing Census (PHC) will meet international standard.

The 2023 Census is scheduled to hold after the General Election in April 2023 across the 36 states and the FCT as the commission conduct a hinge free trial census in 2022 across six (6) Local Government Areas in the six geo-political zone between June - July, 2022.

The Executive Chairman of the Commission, Hon. Nasir Isa Kwarra gave the assurance in Abuja at the National Stakeholders Summit on the 2023 Population and Housing Census organized by NPC in collaboration with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and equally assured Nigerians of the Commission readiness.

The Commission will also deploy man-power as census enumerators that will ensure that accurate data are captured in every locality during the period of the exercise.

Recruitment Census Enumerators

The 2023 Census is estimated to require about 3 million enumerators nationwide across every locality with a budget of about N1 trillion as captured in the 2022 appropriation bill.

The recruitment period is six weeks ahead of the April 2023 deadline for the conduct of the Population and Housing Census (PHC).

The commission will open the census recruitment portal for all Nigerians to participate fully with stipulated requirements and conditions.

2023 Census Overview

The 2022/2023 Census will be Nigeria’s first Digital Census and will change how the Census is being conducted in Nigeria before now. This approach started with the demarcation of enumeration areas covering the entire territorial space of Nigeria using mobile handheld device and geographic information systems (GIS) and satellite imageries to create the digital census maps. The digital frame produced is a major tool for the planning of human and material resources for the Census. This determines the enumerators’ assignment areas and forms a basis for distribution of materials during the Census. See Census Methodology

A Population and Housing Census (PHC) is of great relevance to the economic, political and socio-cultural planning of a country. Reliable and detailed data on the size, structure, distribution and socio-economic and demographic characteristics of a country’s population is required for policy intervention and monitoring of development goals. The 2022 census will be digital therefore increasing the accuracy of data. For the Census, electronic forms hosted in Personal Digital Assistant devices will be used to capture information on all buildings, households and persons in the EA.

For the 2022 PHC, the recruitment and training modalities will be a major deviation from the old order. A recruitment strategy is designed for an e-recruitment in collaboration with the relevant departments and particularly Public Affairs Department to give the recruitment a wide coverage at the grass root. Again, the training plan also leverages greatly on technology as training modalities adopted include, virtual, self-learning and physical learning. Online trainings are scheduled to hold in phases and this has commenced in earnest.

The field operations for the next census will begin with the building and household listing as usual but digital maps will be fetched online as against carrying paper maps as of old, therefore making the entire process paperless. The output of the house numbering and household listing exercise undergoes validation by matching some key parameters including, number of buildings, building uses among others, in the listing with those in the EAD database before approval is given for enumeration to commence when EA passes the validation test.

The 2022 PHC adopts the UN standards and has set census night as the zero hour (12 midnight) of the first Census date. While for each household, the reference period is the time from the zero hour of the first Census-day to the time a household is visited by an enumerator. The time of visitation by an enumerator must therefore be within the zero hour of the first census day to the mid-night of the last day assigned for census enumeration.

A household consists of a person or a group of persons living together under the same roof, sharing the same catering arrangement, recognizing themselves as a unit and acknowledges one adult member as the head. In the 2022 PHC, households are classified under three main categories including, Regular Households, Institutional (long or short stay), Floating /Transient. A new category introduced is the Diplomatic corps for the peculiarities of their stay in the country

A careful consideration has been given to the identification of Internally Displaced Persons (IDP), a new phenomenon in the social strata of the country. It is understood that such persons can be found in varying locations in the country under different circumstances. IDPs have been created as a type of residence in the 2022 Census Questionnaire to ensure that they are captured under their varying population classification. The Census Department from the pre-tests of the methodologies and instruments for the 2022 census have identified that IDPs can be within a Regular household setting, in an Institutional (Long Stay) setting or in a Floating/Transient Population setting.

Sustainable data for the development of Nigeria is at the core of the census while keeping in mind the confidentiality that the Commission owes to the general public. The National Population Commission will destroy names of individuals immediately after analyzing the results. The existing practices and obligations of the National Population Commission will ensure that no information will be released in a way that would enable users of Census data to identify any individual or household. Thus, identifiable census information will never be released or shared with anyone.

NPC: You count, be counted