St. Lucia Country Report By Edwin St Catherine Director, Central Statistical Office Presented to IPUMS Workshop August 24 th, 2007

History of Census Taking Census rounds were organized by the British Government throughout the Caribbean since the early 1840’s. 15 rounds of censuses taken to date only once, in 1931, did St Lucia fail to take a Census. In August of 1843 St Lucia took its very first census.

History of Census Taking Prior to 1991 the census provided the only available island-wide data on employment, unemployment, housing stock, educational etc Census assumed greater importance as base for the first time conduct on a regular basis of various household surveys example, the St Lucia Labour Force survey and the Survey of Living conditions.

Census Documentation past three censuses in St Lucia namely 1980, 1991 and 2001 have all been De jure censuses A housing and A population census Several Sample Frames were produced Business Register based on number employed Agriculture holding frame

Census Documentation The 1991 and the 1980 censuses took approximately a 10-20minute interview per household for completion The 2001 census was took between 30 – 45minutes for completion – for Persons - Full set of Labour Force Questions/Training - Detailed questions on Disability and Health - New Section on Crime, reported and unreported

Census Documentation For Household: - Housing was also more detailed and covered issues of insurance of the physical structure of the house and its contents - the many details were requested on the contents within the house

Census Documentation Obtaining the GPS coordinates of all buildings Sources of this information - Land and Surveys Department - Housing Development Cooperations - GPS units at the Statistical Office Maps were prepared using ArcGIS with buildings as points and enumerators were given instructions to update maps where the census office missed building points

Census Documentation This process enabled the Statistical office to disseminate small area statistics not only based on well understood geographic areas such as Enumeration District, communities and administrative districts but also using non- standard geographic delineations. This has greatly improved the usefulness of the census and allows us to disseminate census data geographically to almost any geographic using ESRI Arcview.

Census Microdata Statistical Office does not have a well defined history of providing micro-datasets from the census or surveys In 1991 the census questionnaire for all English speaking Caribbean countries was harmonized and the same data structure exists for all of the datasets of the countries of the English speaking caribbean through the regional Office CARICOM.

Census Microdata In 1980 we did not disseminate census micro- data in any form I suspect for technological reasons, except to CELADE/CEPAL/ECLAC We worked with CELADE/CEPAL CHILE to convert the Census datasets of 1980, 1991 and 2001 to Redatam the Redatam Database and dissemination tools are used to disseminate all data from all of the censuses

Census Microdata the full micro dataset available to CARICOM and the regional ECLAC office in Trinidad and Tobago for further analysis and reporting Post the conduct of the 2001 census there were increasing demands for the use of microdata. We also maintained the data in SPSS we created a 20% census data sample which we have distributed to persons/institution based on a specific agreement (Sample size dilemma)

Census Microdata The Redatam database was put on the web using the redatam webserver - Uses an encrypted online Database - Builds customized website so we can control access - Gives user power to query the data and produces table suitable to their needs within broad restrictions we impose

Census Microdata Since our 2001 census dataset contains only 142,000 person records and approximately 43,000 household records it is especially vulnerable to specific record identification. This allows for easy violation of the confidentiality laws which govern the dissemination of census data we have therefore to be particularly careful about the dissemination of our micro-dataset. For similar reasons other countries in the English Speaking Caribbean are also very worried about the confidentiality issues given the small size of the census datasets. Some of the census populations of the islands range in size from 5000 in Monsterrat to 20,000 in Anguilla, the largest being Jamaica with 2.6 million.

Census Microdata - IPUMS We have provided 1991 Census Dataset in full to the IPUMS initiative. We will work with IPMUS using the 1991 census until we are reasonable confident about the procedures and protocols for annoymizing the data without any potential negative consequences.