By A Staff Reporter
Kathmandu, June 16: The Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) has been preparing to resume national population census, which was halted due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the ensuing restriction enforced since April 29, from mid-July.
According to Dhundi Raj Lamichhane, chief of national population census section of the CBS, census will start by mid-July if the government allows after considering the gravity of the coronavirus pandemic, and it will be completed within two months, that is by mid-October.
Earlier, the Bureau had already appointed supervisors for the census and imparted a five-day training to them. The supervisors are set to receive another two-day training.The Bureau will also start the process of appointing some 43 thousand enumerators for the once-in-a decade programme. They will be provided with training before they are mobilised to collect data from household visits.
The CBS has said that 85 per cent of the census-related works has been completed. According to the previous action plan, enumeration was scheduled to start by June 22. At least 10 enumerators are needed to be mobilised in a rural municipality for data collection. The government has a plan to mark the census as a national day, not as a mere decennial programme of data collection.