ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) Tuesday released final results of sixth Population and Housing Census-2017, showing that Pakistan’s population is 207.68 million (with -0.043 percent difference with provisional results) and population growth rate of 2.40 percent from 1998 to 2017 with 106.3 million males and 101.3 million females.

The PBS uploaded the final results of 6th population census on its website stated that the Council of Common Interests (CCI) in its meeting held on April 12, 2021, approved the final results of Census-2017.

The census results are exclusive of Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan.

According to the results, the country’s predominant majority 132.013 million or 63.56 lives in rural areas.

The urban population stands at 75.67 million, which is around 36.44 percent of the total population.

As per the final results, Sindh is the most urbanized province having 51.88 percent population in urban areas, whereas, 48.12 percent rural population, while total population of the province is 47.854 million.

Punjab has total population of 109.989 million with 63.14 percent rural and 36.86 percent urban population, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa has 30.508 million population with 81.20 percent rural and 18.8 percent urban population, Balochistan has 12.335 million population with 72.38 percent rural and 27.62 percent urban population, FATA has 4.99 million population with 97.20 percent rural and 2.80 percent urban population, while ICT has 2.003 million population with 49.63 percent rural and 50.37 percent urban population.

Around 55.98 percent population of the country is of age between 15-64 years.

The final results revealed that population growth rate is 2.40 percent in Pakistan, while it is 2.89 percent in KP, 2.40 percent in FATA, 2.13 percent in Punjab, 2.41 percent in Sindh, 3.37 percent in Balochistan and 4.90 percent in ICT. The Punjab has 52.96 percent share in overall population, KP 14.69 percent, FATA 2.40 percent, Sindh 23.04 percent, Balochistan 5.94 percent, and ICT has 0.96 percent share.

According to the data, the country’s literacy rate was 58.92 percent, where it was 64.01 percent in Punjab, 54.57 percent in Sindh, 54.02 percent in KP, 36.08 percent in FATA, 43.58 percent in Balochistan, and 81.49 percent in ICT.

The brief regarding census final results noted that the CCI decided on 16th December 2016 to conduct the Population and Housing Census-2017 in two phases with the support of the armed forces.

In order to conduct Population and Housing Census in the country, the PBS demarcated the whole country into small compact area called Census Blocks comprising 200-250 houses on an average, with total number of 1,68,943 blocks with well-defined boundaries and maps.

The whole delimitation process was carried out with close coordination of the provincial governments, local governments, revenue departments, and the district administrations.

Further provincial coordination committees headed by concerned chief secretaries and secretaries of relevant departments i.e. education, revenue, local government as a members were notified for conduct of transparent, credible census, and for complete coverage. Further divisional, district and census district (Tehsil/Taluka) coordination and vigilance committees were notified for complete coverage of areas, monitoring of data quality and field work of Census-2017.

Appointment of field staff (enumerators, circle supervisors, charge superintendents) was made by the district management from the provincial education, revenue, population welfare, and other related departments.

Census-2017 was conducted in two phases.

Each phase had duration of 30 days. Phase-I started from 15th March and ended on 14th April 2017 in which 61 admin districts comprising 79,773 blocks were enumerated.

Phase-II started with a gap of 10 days from 25th April till 24th May 2017.

89 admin districts comprising 89,170 blocks were enumerated during this period.

The field operation consisted of first three days for house listing followed by 10 days for population count and one day for enumeration of homeless population.

De-Jure approach (usual place for residence) used for data collection as per practice adopted in the past censuses.

In order to lend credibility to the Census operation, the pattern of 1998-Census was adopted, with a solider accompanying each enumerator.

One team was assigned two blocks in the same area.

The total civilian field and monitoring staff deputed by provincial governments was 108,000.

The Armed Forces provided 200,000 army personnel for Census duty, of which, 44,000 were deployed with civilian enumerators.

The remaining personnel were used for security duty, command structure, and logistic support.

For successful conduct of Census, improvement in census processes and involvement of stakeholders, government of Pakistan constituted a sub-committee of the governing council of the PBS consisting of renowned demographers and experts on 31st January 2017 with terms of reference to oversee the whole census process from trainings, data collection, processing and finalisation of results.

Provinces on request of federal government constituted provincial technical committees to monitor the data processing and finalisation of results process.

Further, team of international (5)/national (12) visited all the provinces and Gilgit-Baltistan to ascertain the quality of the Census and adoption of the international standards.

Further, control rooms were established in provincial level and the PBS Headquarters for redressal of the complaints receives during Census operation.

Keeping in view the sensitivity of the Census results, the Cabinet decided to constitute a ministers committee on 11.02.2020 for detailed deliberations on the matter with stakeholders and for recommendations regarding finalisation of results of Census-2017.

The Committee conducted six meetings and after extensive discussions and considerations submitted its report with recommendations for approval of results of Census-2017 in larger national interest and to the conduct next census earlier possible by adopting modern technologies.

The Cabinet in its meeting held on 22.12.2020 approved the committee recommendations for forwarding it to the CCI for final consideration being the competent forum.

The CCI in its meeting held on 12.04.2021 deliberated on the subject and approved the final results of Census-2017.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021