The 2023 Census: High Level Design sets out the priorities for the 2023 Census, the scope of what is being developed, and how the next census will be different to the 2018 Census.
“Design and development work for the 2023 Census is focusing on delivering a respondent-centric census that is prioritising collaboration, census participation, and quality data,” Deputy Government Statistician and Deputy Chief Executive for Census and Collection Operations Simon Mason said.
“We are committed to working with our census customers, Treaty partners, and community stakeholders to understand their needs, build trust and confidence in census, build data capability, and ultimately value for them through census participation and use of census data.”
The design of the 2023 Census builds on what worked well in the 2018 Census and fixes what did not work.
“Our goal for the 2023 Census is to deliver the highest response rates possible to produce census data that represents both Aotearoa New Zealand and our communities,” Simon Mason said.
“To achieve this, we are prioritising solutions to address barriers to participation for population groups with historically lower response rates, and we will make it easier for all to participate in the census and complete census forms.”
Key features of the 2023 Census include:
- earlier and sustained engagement with communities
- earlier census collection
- more census collectors
- more assistance to complete census forms
- the option of doing the census online or on paper
- increased focus on accessibility, different formats, and language support
- earlier and localised communications and marketing
- a combined census model by design
- the inclusion of gender and sexual identity questions.
“Census teams are now progressing more detailed design and development work, which will be communicated as decisions are made,” Simon Mason said.
“The Census Programme is also preparing for a full end-to-end test of census operations in March 2022 in parts of Auckland, Tauranga, and Eastern Bay of Plenty/Whakatāne. Field tests are critical to validating our design and understanding the conditions and factors that may impact implementation, participation, and response rates in the 2023 Census.”
With a focus on higher response rates and data quality, the design of the 2023 Census allows for less change to census content, and to the products and services delivered after the census.
The Census Programme will publish a final report on the content of the 2023 Census in late October 2021.
