Census in 2020 to give geo-spatial profile of Maltese population

Malta’s forthcoming national census will for the first time ever include a record of the coordinates of each dwelling and the results from the census, based on a one square-kilometre grid.

The geocoding of the results will allow a geospatial element at analysis stage, which means that for the first time ever the National Statistics Office will publish results from the census right down to a ‘street level’ analysis.

The theme for Census 2021, which starts in October 2020, is inclusiveness with the slogan ‘Everyone Matters’, which means the census project will attempt to cover all groups in the population. The questionnaire will be available in various languages.

A preliminary report featuring the main demographic variables will be published in the first quarter of 2022, and a detailed analysis will be released in thematic publications starting from the last quarter of 2022.

The Census is a nationwide project held every ten years and involves a comprehensive survey to enumerate all permanent residents in Malta. The 2021 edition is the eighteenth census since 1842, providing a snapshot of the people residing in Malta.

Census 2021 will survey Malta’s population of 500,000 living in private households and in about 250 institutional households. The entire population spread over 68 local councils will be evenly divided into over 1,000 enumeration areas, with each area typically encompassing an average of 220 dwellings.

The enumeration areas will be assigned to about 1,000 field interviewers recruited purposely for the Census. These will collect the data directly from the households.

Census 2021 will for the first time offer people the option to fill in the questionnaire through an online form. The time needed to complete the online questionnaire is approximately 20 minutes for a conventional household of three persons.

Another novelty is that the interviewers visiting the households will record the information in tablet computers rather than through the traditional paper questionnaire, improving information security by encrypting all data so that only authorised Census personnel with access to a secret key or password can read it. 

The National Statistics Office is launching the public consultation through this communication. Stakeholders are invited to send their written submissions to email [email protected] by Sunday 31 May 2020.