WATCH: ZimStat concerned over lack of co-operation from corporates

THE Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZimStat) has expressed concern over business operators who resist providing credible information to enumerators under the preliminary data collection exercise for the ground-breaking Economic Census saying this may affect the outcome of the survey.

The country will hold its first ever Economic Census next year that will guide the crafting of the National Development Strategy (NDS2) and provide a holistic picture on the size of the country’s economy.

The Economic Census is also expected to cover underground economic activities with the mapping exercise, which started in July having been concluded on August 31.

Yesterday, the statistics agency launched the training of enumerators on the Economic Census Listing Exercise in Bulawayo as part of the business enumeration areas. Speaking on the sidelines of the event, ZimStat acting director-general, Mrs Fadzai Ndlovu raised concerns over the conduct by some business players who were withholding critical information during the ended mapping exercise.

She said it was critical for economic players to provide accurate data to enumerators, as this will help in correctly providing statistics on the size of the economy.

“As ZimStat, our message to businesses that are involved in various sectors is that as our enumerators come to their business places, may they please assist them with the information that we are looking for,” said Mrs Ndlovu.

“As we have said, the information that we gather is going to be used for policy formulation and also for decision making.

“Once we have information that enables policy makers to make decisions and policies then we can have a better Zimbabwe. Some of the challenges that were faced by our enumerators in the field is the issue of business owners not readily accepting or agreeing to talk to them.”

However, because this is a massive exercise, Mrs Ndlovu said the enumerator always has supervisors who then intervene when such incidents occur and usually, they smoothen the process.

She said the listing exercise involves the listing of actual businesses, which have been incorporated under the ended mapping exercise.

The listing exercise will provide a clear picture on the work to be carried out when the Economic Census counting starts.

“This exercise is essential because it will enable us as we will soon be going for our main data collection exercise to actually know how much work we are expecting in each business enumeration area,” said Mrs Ndlovu.

“Also, as we are doing the listing, it will enable us to also have a view of what sectors our economy is operating in. This is the exercise that is taking off after we had just ended the mapping exercise, which began in July.

“In the mapping exercise we were sub-dividing the country into working areas known as business enumeration areas where we are going to send our listers to go and list all the businesses within those business enumeration areas,” she said.