Page 90 - Special Topic Session (STS) - Volume 1

STS407 Jairo C. et al.
items in the PHC, and even joint data collections. The relationship
between the two censuses can cover (FAO & UNFPA, 2012):
 Coordinating aspects of the two censuses in terms of use of
common concepts, definitions and classifications; sharing field
materials; building enumeration areas which suit both censuses;
organization of fieldwork.
 Using the listing of the PHC as a starting point for the frame for the
household sector of the AC;
 Collecting agriculture-related data in the PHC to identify the
households engaged in own-account agricultural production
households (either through few basic items or adding an agriculture
module).
There are many country examples of integration of the AC and the PHC.
Some 60 countries included agriculture-related items in their PHCs in the 2010
census round. Sri Lanka conducted the census of the agricultural sector jointly
with the Economic Census 2013/2014. It is anticipated that in the upcoming
censuses more and more countries would be looking for better linkage
between these censuses. Some Pacific island countries, particularly those
composed of scattered atolls, have included or are planning to include an
agriculture module in their PHC to deal with high fieldwork costs and logistical
challenges.
The integration of data collections within the NSS requires, in many
countries, to improve the legal and institutional framework and to build
statistical capacity across the different institutions concerned, as well as the
support of the government to optimize the data collections in line with
statistical plans and programmes and secure budgetary allocations.

4. Discussion and Conclusion
Growing user demands for relevant, reliable and coherent data, and the
need to improve cost-efficiency, require additional efforts in many countries
towards achieving better integration of statistical collections within the NSS.
The AC, as the backbone of the system of integrated agricultural censuses
and surveys should not be overburdened with a wide range of numerous items
that may affect the quality of collected data. Instead, the census should focus
on a coherent and manageable set of items, assuming that other (non-
structural) data needed more frequently are available in a comparable form
from regular agricultural sample surveys and other sources.
The alternative modalities of census data collection constitutes important
ways to better integrate and improve cost-effectiveness of data collections. The
use of registers as sources of census data, which is relevant for countries with
well-developed administrative registers, would contribute to a better correlation

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