Padu can help simplify nationwide census data collection

Mohd Uzir says more than 900 Padu counters have been set up nationwide to help people register.

Central Database Hub (Padu) registrations have the potential to replace the traditional method of hiring enumerators to conduct face-to-face surveys nationwide for the Malaysian Population and Housing Census.

Department of Statistics Malaysia chief statistician Datuk Seri Mohd Uzir Mahidin said to date, more than 900 Padu counters have been set up nationwide to help people register.

“Padu has the potential to become our new medium (of collecting population data) to replace the previous method of conducting interviews every 10 years.

“We still need to explore this possibility, as has been done in advanced economies like The Netherlands,” he said.

The last time the census was conducted was in 2020, when about 99,356 enumerators were hired to conduct the face-to-face surveys nationwide, and the effort reached 32.7 million Malaysians, said Mohd Uzir.

“We started with the first phase of the census through the online e-Census from July 7 to Sept 30, 2020.

“The second phase involved a face-to-face interview between Oct 7 and Oct 24, but they were postponed a few times due to the Covid-19 pandemic and MCO.

“There were 115,685 personnel involved in the census, including 14,595 census supervisors and 1,385 enumerator officers,” he said, adding that the overall operation cost was around RM413mil.

This includes the development projects, system purchase and operation, including payment to the enumerators involved, added Mohd Uzir.

“The introduction of Padu could actually cut the cost of government spending on conducting these interviews.”

As of Jan 9, a total of 905,548 Malaysians had registered under the Padu system.

“If we include the children under 18 who are still under their parents’ care, we actually have more than one million people registered, as announced by Economy Minister Rafizi Ramli.” — By REMAR NORDIN