JOIN USKarnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Wednesday launched the 7th economic census in the state that will be completely app-based and provide insights into all economic activities and ownership patterns of businesses.
It is being conducted under the Joint Venture between Common Services Centres (CSC), along with state and central governments, and the information collected will be broadly used in planning and policy formulations, officials said.
"The economic census will help in knowing the reality of economic condition of the country and its results will act as a compass for the programmes that the government has to implement and framing of policies," Yediyurappa said.
Speaking after taking part in the census by providing his information to enumerators, he said the census being done through a mobile app was "praiseworthy" as it will help in quick collection of information and generating accurate reports.
Yediyurappa also asked enumerators to collect accurate information from people by taking them into confidence and also requested the public to extend their cooperation. The economic census will be held in the state from November 15, 2019 to March 2020 under the aegis of the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation.
Under the census, enumerators will meet about 55 lakh households in urban areas and 82 lakh households in the rural areas of the state. About 8,720 enumerators in urban areas and 30,000 in rural areas will work for the census along with supervisors.
Seventy officials from the central government and 258 from the state government have been appointed to supervise the exercise.
"During the census, information regarding activities in the organised and unorganised sectors and about people working in these sectors will be collected. The information collected will help in framing of various policies," V Manjula Additional chief secretary DPAR (GOK) said.
Mobile phone application will be used to conduct the census to collect information, in partnership with CSC. A K Toprani, Additional Director General at Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (GOI) said, Karnataka accounts for nearly five per cent of the total establishments at all India level.
"Economic census is population census plus. In population census we will try and find out number of families and its members, while in economic census, we contact households, establishments, collect information from them and find out what are the entrepreneurial activities conducted across the state," he said.
He also said two surveys on annual basis have been planned for the year 2020-21 on the service sector and unincorporated sector to know more in detail about the economic activities.
Vijay Kumar, Director General at the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (GOI) said the history of economic census in the country was more than four decades old The first such census was held in 1977 and later in 1980, 1990, 1998, 2005 and 2014.
The present census was the first of its kind in many ways as it is done through mobile app, he said, adding that the field work has already started in 22 states and Union Territories.