THE COMING CENSUS.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume XXXIII, Issue 11203, 25 February 1891, Page 2

THE COMING CENSUS.

+ (Pbb-United Pbess Association.) Wellington^ February 24. . Preparations for taking the census on the night of, Sunday, April sth, are prac- ■ tically complete. • The colony has been divided into 23 sections, composed each .of one. or more ounties, and boroughs included in them. Each is. allotted a chief enumerator, and there are in all about 660 siib-enumerators. The woik is to be done, partly by contract and partly by day work, the pay for the latter ranging frp,m 10s per day on foot to 15s or £1 where a horse has to be employed. . jdach enumerator will be .provided with the usual schedule map of the district and a bobkVin, which lie -will enter the number of schedules and the number of persons on each, schedule according to locality. On this 'occasion an important alteration in the system of compiliation is to be introduced. However large the schedules and minute the subdivisions it has always been found impossible to obtain sufficient elasticity of combination in making up the records. Cards have, therefore, been deviled with columns for ages, occupation/&c, one of which will be devoted to each resident in the colony. These cards will not be issued to the census takers, but will be compiled in the head office from the sohedulesi and it is believed that by their use it will be possible to divide*' the people of the country into' any and every group or combination that may be Wanted, The card system is partly the fesultof the Statistical Conference at Hobart last year, but the arrangement is not the same as that of the other colonies. Mr Brown, the Registrar General, has dravn it up en a plan especially devised for New Zealand, -which he thinks will affoid the greatest' possible elasticity, of combination. Although there will thus ' -be over $00,000 of these cards to handle the' Department estimate that - the work will be made more easy and expeditious than under the former system of huge schedules, which, however big they might be, yet could not be made to contain every grouping that was desired. A separate Maori census will be taken through the agency of the Native Department, but as- usuil it -will not be so exact as the European enumeration, as for'the requisite informrtion the statemeats of the natives themselves will have >to be largely relied upon. Mr Brown does not anticipate ■ that the coming census will show any such large and tinexjected increase as ' Auckland, for instance, did in 1886, but he is of opinion Ghat the West Coast of the North Island will reveal a considerable alteration in numbers on the right side. The large boiougha will probably be stationery or sh»w a slight decrease. One reason of this confidence is that for some years arrangements have been made with the Union Company which permit an almost exact check to be kept on the outgoing population, and returns based on this information and published regularly in the Gazette permit the Department to fairly keep pace with tlie ebb and flow of population as a whole. " ' -1 'I ———.-i ___m__»-_~—i