Statistics SA (Stats SA) is urging South Africans to support the Community Survey (CS) 2016. More than 10 000 fieldworkers have been visiting communities since Monday to gather information from 1.3 million dwelling units across the country and will finish on 22 April.
Stats SA’s Free State spokesperson, Nthabiseng Chakela, requests residents to open their doors to fieldworkers.
“In order for residents to verify fieldworkers contracted by Stats SA, they would be carrying official ID cards, which included a hologram image to verify authenticity. The ID card had to be produced when visiting sampled homes. They will also be wearing yellow aprons with CS written on it and our cars will be having yellow stickers on the two side doors and also on the rear windows.”
Meanwhile, Northern Cape’s Statistical Support and Informatics Manager, Phemelo Motoma, says the survey is an essential tool in service delivery whereby residents will provide demographic and socio-economic data at municipal level to improve government planning.
“This information is important for all stakeholders to enable them to plan and assess the gap,” says Motoma.
The basic information that the survey will gather includes people’s level of education, the dwellings they live in, statistics on income and ownership of household goods, access to electricity and piped water, types of toilets, fertility, cause of death, migration, home ownership and much more.
This year, digital technology will boost the efficiency and size of the survey. Instead of filling out households’ information on paper, fieldworkers will be able to capture it on electronic devices. The technology will also speed up the release of the survey results by the end of June.
Stats SA indicates that the speedy delivery of the results will be especially useful for the upcoming municipal elections, to be held countrywide later this year, and the survey will give voters objective data on what services have been delivered to what areas, as well as what yet remains to be done.
Stats SA may be contacted through the call centre on 0800-110-248 or by sending e-mail to [email protected] public queries relating to the survey.
REFILWE GAESWE
