Census challenges during a pandemic

by Sorana Mitchell

Grenada is not alone in the quagmire of data collection for a census during a pandemic. Representatives from Anguilla, St Kitts and Nevis, and Jamaica shared their experiences of a similar predicament at a virtual session, ‘Let’s talk about the Census!’ initiated by the Caricom Secretariat, on 28 April 2022. They too, had to delay the start of their Population and Housing Census.

In Grenada’s case, this being the 14th census and the first to be conducted digitally, the Director of Statistics at the Grenada Central Statistical Office, Halim Brizan, did not count on Covid-19, a general election, and carnival, among other issues, to hinder the start and progress of Census 2021, now being conducted in 2022.

Under the theme: “Nothing About us without us because we all count,” media advertisements bombarded the populace in a drive to sensitise the public. Brizan explained: “Census date was originally carded for the 15th of September 2021, and at the same time, we had the onset of the Delta variant, and we had no choice but to close activities until… and then, as we were about to put them [enumerators] out into the field based on what happened with Covid, the Delta variant, the Ministry of Health advised that we would have to add a vaccination requirement for our field staff… We pushed back the start of census until the 10th of November… and that is when we got that vaccination mandate, and we lost more than half of our field workers as a result, because of the vaccination hesitancy.”

He continued, “but we decided that we would start with who we have anyway. We started with a staggered approach because at the time, we were not sure what would happen with Covid, but we [knew] the census had to get done. That was the recommendation from the International Statistical Body, that we need to find a way to live with the pandemic.”

Although the Central Statistical Office forged ahead, Brizan admitted that not much data was collected. He noted that since they were not able to hold adequate training sessions on how to use the tablet computers, there was a lot of “hand-holding” in the field. When they thought they had hit their stride, in came the Omicron variant in early 2022, which led to several staff becoming ill.

Following that was the general election. He said, “election time is not the best time to do a census. The place is politically charged. Sometimes you may not get the reception from the public, especially if they feel that they are not in support of the then administration. As much as we tried to depoliticise it, it’s still an activity of that administration, so some persons gave resistance. And you had canvassing by both political parties and census workers out in the field. It’s a time when you’re putting unnecessary burden on the respondents.”

Another challenge he sighted was the high turnover of census staff and low subscription for the temporary positions. He attributed this first to vaccine hesitancy and then to the attraction of long-term work as opposed to short-term employment provided by his office to conduct the census.

To manage this, Brizan said they compiled all their virtual training videos and placed them online (on their YouTube channel), where prospective enumerators could view the videos and train at their own pace before they were brought in for practical training with the devices and then finally out into the field.

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the Central Statistical Office introduced the use of telephone interviews as well as the use of callback cards. However, Brizan said not many households have been utilising the callback cards, which has put extra pressure on the workers. Enumerators have been encouraged to conduct the surveys after 4 pm and to work on weekends to get a better response rate.

The new administration, he noted, has been supportive of the process by including incentives for completed work, as well as increased pay for enumerators of up to over EC$4,000.

With the time remaining to complete the census, Brizan called for the full support of the public. He reiterated that they cannot do the census alone. Brizan said the census provides key information on demographics such as education, health, and housing, which are important data to have as a planning tool for the sustainable development of the country over the next 10 years.

At the time of this publication, the Director of Statistics admitted that they were far from halfway through, and the date of completion was scheduled to be towards the end of November 2022. Brizan said the two parishes that have suffered the most are the two largest: St George and St Andrew, due to limited enumerators, but he mentioned St David and St Mark as two parishes where work has been going smoothly.

By comparison, Brizan said in 2011, which was the first census he administered, the period of data collection was shorter, but the data processing was longer. However, with the use of tablets (about 400 were procured) to collect data electronically, they can process the data simultaneously and monitor enumerators, thus reducing false reports.