KATMANDU, NOVEMBER 9

The Nepal Policy Institute, established with the active participation of the Nepalese diaspora as an international think tank, recently hosted a virtual policy dialogue session on the upcoming census.

The objective of the dialogue session was to highlight the importance of the census in policy making processes in particular, and for development in general. It also served to emphasize the need for quality and completeness of the census.

The current national census exercise (the 12th in this series) will begin on November 11 and end on November 21. NPI Board Chairman Khagendra Dhakal said the census exercise provided an opportunity to generate useful information and data that would aid in broader policy analysis and research.

It focused on a “whole-of-society approach” that would involve government entities, civil society, political parties and the general population to ensure that the census was a meaningful exercise. This, he said, also requires a high degree of collaboration and coordination between different levels of government.

Dhakal asked the Central Bureau of Statistics to coordinate entities outside Nepal so that the census can accurately capture all relevant information about people. NPI board member Sharu Joshi mentioned that NPI’s research had shown that nearly 70 percent of Nepalese living abroad had little or no knowledge of what was happening in the country.

“The fact that the census contains 80 questions,” she said, “means the government is very keen to collect as much relevant information as possible. As this is the first census to be taken after the introduction of the federal form of government, “she said, adding that it was an important step towards the institutionalization of federalism in the country.

The Deputy Director General of the Central Bureau of Statistics, Hem Raj Regmi, said carrying out the census was a challenge, especially since the CBI, with a staff of 500 officials, was expected to coordinate the work of more than 500 investigators and Providing training. everyone and be ready to carry out the exercise in 15 days. He said privacy concerns in the census had been taken into account and urged everyone to provide information freely.

A total of 9,000 supervisors have also been trained, as have the 40,000 people who will collect the data. Given that the census contains 80 questions, it was rated as “important”, but since it contributes to a range of variables, as well as to the SDG indicators, this was deemed appropriate.

Dharam KC, international coordinator of MigWorks (based in Saudi Arabia) stressed that the census should also seek definitive information on returning migrants, such as India. Even though the number of Nepalese living abroad runs into the millions, there is no official record of this.

A version of this article appears in the November 10, 2021 print of The Himalayan Times.