The 2010 round of population and housing censuses : a guide on census planning and enumeration for African countries

Abstract

The United Nations (UN) Principles and Recommendations (P&R) for the Population and Housing Census (PHC) Revision 2 defines a PHC as “the total process of collecting, compiling, evaluating, analysing and publishing or otherwise disseminating demographic, economic and social data pertaining, at a specified time, to all persons in a country or a well-defined part of the country”. Population censuses collect information on every individual in a defined geographical area, and hence provide information on the size and distribution of the population as well as its characteristics. Thus, censuses are used to generate demographic and socio-economic indicators.