Budget cut for 2011 population census

BAME PIET
Staff Writer | Thursday November 19, 2009 00:00

 

Launching the census yesterday, Minister of Finance, Kenneth Matambo said that the Central Statistics Office (CSO) will do everything in its power, despite the limited resources to make the exercise a success.

The economic recession has affected every government department including development projects. He said that Botswana has successfully carried out census every 10 years since independence in 1972, 1981, 1991 and 2001 and they all conformed with international standards. 'The 2011 census will give us an opportunity to reflect and take stock of our achievements, identify challenges as well as get a deeper understanding of other emerging challenges like orphanage and disabilities among others,' he said.

Matambo added that ideas and suggestions from other stakeholders are welcome. He said that the success of the census depends on the involvement, participation and cooperation of everyone including development partners, residents and citizens.'Everybody must open their doors to the teams of mappers and enumerators.

The information requested will be used to plan and guide our country's development process. It will also assist us to monitor other development commitments, including the Millennium Development Goals, which have, just like Vision 2016, become an important component of our development aspirations,' he said. The theme of the census is: 'My count, my guide to development'.

At the launch, Argentina Matavel, a representative of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) said that she will advocate for Botswana to be supported to have a successful census. She said that she will be leaving the country in the next few days, after serving for three years, but she will make sure that the UNFPA gives both technical and financial support for the census.  She said that unlike 2001 when the Botswana government fully funded the census, this time the economic recession presents a big challenge.

Inadequate funding will either compromise the quality of the data or its analysis, or both.All will agree with me that good data is critical to any good planning. And we all can use good data,' she said.

The preliminary activities of the census have already commenced such as the arrival of an international chief technical advisor and a national census coordinator. Cartographic work has started and information meetings at district level are well underway.

Consultations for the design of the questionnaire advisory and technical committees have been formed.

Parliamentarians and researchers have in the past accused the CSO of providing outdated data. But CSO head Annah Majelantle has said they are doing fairly well and they always present final analysis within reasonable time after fieldwork. She said the data they release depends on what the survey was about or the kind of information needed. She cited inflation statistics as an area where they are close to perfect as they release figures every month.