Public urged to cooperate during census

The Director General of the National Institute of Statistics, Yusuf Murangwa, has called upon busy Rwandans to commit their time to the forthcoming national population and housing census in order for it to achieve the required accuracy.During an interview with The New Times, Murangwa said that the counting process will take only two weeks and will be conducted especially during day time, a time when many Rwandans are at work and not available in their homes.However the institute is convinced that this will not create a major challenge as it endeavours to be as accurate as possible in the census.“When we visit a home to carry out a census and find that people are not around, we will leave a note asking them for an appointment. Therefore, we will be able to carry out the census at the time of their convenience, even during weekends,” Murangwa said.“We know that many people leave their homes early in the morning and return back in the evenings after work. We however call upon all employers to give their workers at least an hour off to tend to the census.”The national population and housing census will kick off on August 15, 2012 and will be aided by mapping work that was concluded by NISR, detailing more than 14,700 villages and landmarks in all administrative parts of the country.This is going to be the fourth national population and housing census carried out; the others were conducted in 1978, 1991 and 2002.It has a budget to the tune of Rwf16.5 billion.Get more details in the Q&A