Following the completion of national population and housing census on August 30, the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda (NISR) is set to kick off a post enumeration survey in 180 selected enumeration areas across the country.

The survey will run from September 16 to 30 and is aimed to confirm with the main census coverage.

According to Venant Habarugira, Director of Censuses at NISR, the survey is different from the main census in terms of size because only a sample of six enumeration areas in each of the 30 districts that make Rwanda will be covered.

He said it will help the institution to find out, on average, if enumerators have reached every household and have asked census questions as required.

However, he continued, based on how the main census unfolded and how people showed up, we don’t expect different data, but we carry out the survey so that the institutions involved in conducting the main census can have confidence regarding its coverage and quality.

Habarugira also mentioned that NISR will use a team of enumerators which is different from the one the institution deployed during the main census.

"We trained them with other enumerators for them to get general knowledge on the main census, but we are going to train them again specifically on the survey,” he said.

Listing exercise for the selected enumeration areas for the survey will happen on September 14.

Data analysis phase has already started

Due to the use of technology, NISR saved time for data entry.

"Even during the data collection period,” said Habarugira. "We had already developed thematic tables, quality check syntaxes and syntaxes to produce analysis tables.”

He noted that after data processing analysis, NISR will make about 50 reports on population size, population growth and living conditions of all Rwandans.

Among the reports, he continued, we will have about 30 district profiles summarising all the reports at district level to help them in planning, monitoring and evaluation but also at national level.

Habarugira declared that NISR plans to have preliminary results before the end of December 2022 with key statistics that can be utilised in the national planning and detailed reports by December 2023.

"Starting December 2022, census results will be utilisable for national planning,” he said.