| Workshop on Population Data Analysis, Storage and
Dissemination Technologies |
| Bangkok, 27-30 March 2001 |
STAT/WDT/Cambodia
20 March 2001
ENGLISH ONLY
ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COMMISSION FOR ASIA AND THE PACIFIC
Workshop on Population Data Analysis, Storage
and Dissemination Technologies
27-30 March 2001
Bangkok |
| Country paper: Cambodia1/ |
| Contents |
| |
1/ This
paper has been reproduced as submitted. It has been issued without
formal editing.
|
| Name of Participant: |
- Has Bunton, Chief,
Computer Center, National Institute of Statistics,
National Institute of Statistics (NIS), Ministry
of Planning.
- Yem Soung, Deputy Director
of Demographic Statistics Department, National
Institute of Statistics (NIS), Ministry of
Planning.
|
| Background |
| Cambodia is located in South-east Asia. It covers an
area of approximately 181,035 square kilometers.
According to the census of Population of Cambodia
in 1998, the population was about 11.44 million,
in which 48,19 per cent males and 51.81 per cent
females. |
| Cambodia has a young population with 42.82 per cent
between the age of 0 and 14 years and only 3.45
per cent aged 65 and over. The dependency ratio
was, therefore, about 50, and the sex ratio was
93. |
| About
the National Institute of Statistics (NIS) |
| The current regulated organization and functions state
that the National Institute of Statistics is composed
of 4 departments. These are General Statistics
Department, Economic Statistics Departments, Social
Statistics Department, and Statistical Demography
Census and Survey Department. The Organization
Chart of the NIS is given in the Appendix. |
| Location |
| Currently, the NIS has two buildings in separate locations.
The main building, which is also the head office,
is situated behind the Ministry of Planning, No.
386 Preh Monivong Blvd, Phnom Penh. Another building,
which is designated for census activities and
statistical information, locates at No. 27, Street
392, Khan Chamcar Mon, Phnom Penh. |
| Organization's
Function: |
| The National Institute of Statistics (NIS) is the principal
agency of the government responsible for the collection,
compilation, analysis, publication, and dissemination
of the statistical data and information relating
to the Socio-Economic condition of the people
in private and government establishments and enterprises,
including demographic statistics, national accounts,
consumer price indices and other related services
within the Kingdom of Cambodia. The NIS is also
mandated to take charge in the maintenance, updating
and implementation of statistical program for
the Cambodian Government. The responsibility of
coordinating with other government statistical
agencies is also a function of the office. |
| From 1993 to 1994, the NIS has conducted three statistical
surveys. These are the Socio-Economic Survey of
Cambodia 1993/1994 (SESC), the Industrial Establishments
1993 (SIE) and Retail Price Survey. All these
surveys have been designed and implemented under
the auspices of the United Nations Development
Program (UNDP)/Asian Development Bank (ADB). This
project entitled Strengthening Macroeconomics
Management and Training. |
| In March 1996, a nationwide survey on demography entitled
Demographic Survey was conducted by the NIS. This
survey was supported by the United Nations Population
Fund (UNFPA). Also, The UNFPA was the principle
organization that had provided technical assistances
and fund for the preparation and operation of
the National Population Census in March 3, 1998. |
| In June 1996, the Socio-Economic survey of Cambodia
1996 (SESC) was implemented. This activity was
sponsored by ADB, UNDP, CARERE. United Nations
Children Fund (UNICEF) and International Labour
Organization (IOL). |
| Before the end of 1996, the implementation of survey
of Establishments covering Transportation, Construction
and Hotel Wholesale Trade Industry were conducted,
along with the Production Survey (Paddy and Maize).
These surveys are sponsored by ADB. |
| In June 1997 the National Institute of Statistics conducted
one survey for Socio-Economic of Cambodia. These
survey sponsored by UNDP/World Bank. |
| In September 1999, another large-scale survey, entitled
Cambodia Demographic and Health Survey, has been
initialized and expected to deliver its final
report by April 2001. |
| Hopefully, other surveys will follow in the early of
next the century, year 2000 or so. |
| These stress the importance and urgent need of this
training, which is one of the major techniques
required for Management and Dissemination of the
data and information. |
| Census
and Survey Equipments and Experiences of the National
Institute of Statistics (NIS), Cambodia |
| 1.
The NIS and its Processing Equipments: |
| The Cambodia statistical system was dependent mostly
on the then existing administrative reporting
network that was set up to meet the centralized
planning of a socialist economy. As the country
undergoes through the transition from a centrally
planned economy to a market economy, naturally,
the demand for more comprehensive socio-economic
data has also increased considerably. Thus it
has become necessary for the NIS to lessen its
dependency on the administrative reporting network
and collect primary data on its own implementing
various household and economic statistics for
the government, the central statistical agency
has also been improved accordingly. |
| To fulfill the increasing responsibilities of NIS, manpower
aspect has been considerably emphasized in recent
years. Total staff strength has been significantly
improved. At present, the NIS has a total strength
of staff of nearly 200 at the center. There are
nearly the same strength in 24 provinces which
run under provincial planning office. About 30
per cent of the staff possess Bachelor degrees
where as majority of the staff have completed
only secondary level education. Thus, it is imperative
that most of the NIS staffs are given special
training in order to be more productive and efficient. |
| The processing equipments of the Statistics Department
(currently, NIS) had started from a number of
simple calculators and 2 typewriters in 1993.
Thank to the technical assistances and supports
of ADB, UNDP, UNFPA, WB, and other organizations,
the NIS is currently powered by almost a 100 computers
and peripherals. About 60 per cent of them are
interconnected in two local area networks. Due
to the high cost and funding constraints, the
NIS now has one PC with Internet Access through
dial-up connection and 3 other PCs with email-only
access. |
| As mentioned on the current organizational structure,
NIS has four departments led by directors and
deputy directors; thirteen (13) bureaus headed
by bureau chiefs. Computer Center is one of these
bureaus. |
| 2.
Census and Survey experiences of NIS: |
| A computer center has been established under the new
organizational structure of the N1S. The center,
which is of the status of a bureau, has been assigned
to process census and survey data collected by
NIS. Specifically, to develop appropriate data
entry program for census and surveys, write programs
for consistency and range edit checks, produce
tables and maintain secondary data collect from
various organizations. The computer center of
NIS is still at the primitive stage. Though, the
Center has gained significant computer processing
experience in the last seven years. |
| The Socio-economic survey of Cambodia (SESC)1993/94:
The survey was conducted in four rounds
collecting household information from 5,578 households
in 498 villages of Cambodia focusing mainly on
consumption expenditure. NIS had engaged two officer
as data entry supervisor and 15 staff as key entry
operator. They were trained in key entry, verification
and error corrections. The key-in entries were
done using a data entry program named SESCDE (Socio-economic
Survey Of Cambodia Data Entry) which was prepared
by the UNDP/ADB Project staff using a facility
of Census Entry (CENTRY) program, an integrated
set of programs designed for data processing developed
by the US Bureau of the Census. Further, supervisors
were trained to use a tailored program for the
SESC which enabled the operator to do following
tasks: |
- Establish sampling
frame
- Select samples
- Validate listing forms
and folio-file
- Merge files
- Tabulate survey results
- Initialize data diskettes
- Back up/ Restore and System
files
|
| The survey had used 14 desktop
computers and 4 notebook for the processing operation
of the survey. |
| Cambodia Socio-economic Survey 1997: The
survey was conducted with a single round operation
interviewing 6000 households in 474 villages.
The processing was also conducted in one round
engaging 35 manual editors and 20 key entry operators.
Key entry was conducted in a network system using
2 servers and 20 desktops and 2 laptop computers.
Data entry programs and editing programs were
developed using IMPS. However, SPSS and Excel
were used to extract and prepare tables. |
| National population census 1998: Demographic
survey of Cambodia 1996 was conducted as a preparatory
survey for National Population Census 1998. Experience
for the data processing activities of the census
was gained form the survey. Eighty manual coders
and editors and 60 data entry operators were trained
and engaged for the processing of the census.
It took about a year for manual coding and key
entry operation. IMPS and SPSS are the main software
used for computer processing. Altogether, 50desktops
were used for the processing operation. The processing
of census has provided NIS with a precious experience
of handling a huge operation. |
| The manual coding and editing of the census documents
were done in two stages. First, the summary statements
were scrutinized and edited. This provided the
basis for the preliminary census results, which
were released in August 1998. The second stage
was concentrated on the coding and editing of
the main census questionnaire (Form B). This activity
is completed within 14 months (by May 1999) after
the fieldwork. Computer editing helped in removing
errors and inconsistencies in the data set. The
computerized individual census data were used
to generate a number of statistical tables. For
this purpose, a Tabulation Plan has been prepared
taking into account the user needs. The production
of sub-national tabulations could commence by
November-December 1998 which provided a standard
format of Provincial, District and commune level
tabulations, and was useful for the initial analysis
of the census results. |
| The demographic survey was followed by the long awaited
national census, which was successfully conducted
in March 1998. There were 25,000 enumerators including
teachers, staff of the Ministry of Planning and
NIS, officers at the villages, communes and districts
involved in census interview operation. Sixty
manual encoders, 54 data entry operators, 4 machine
supervisors, and 3 machine editing supervisors
was trained and engaged in the processing of the
census questionnaires. The De Facto enumeration,
Canvasser method, and Geographical Frame were
adopted as the Census's methodology. |
| Methods and Technologies
Used in the Census Analysis |
| The analyses of the census results were done under the
technical support of UNFPA/CST and ESCAP resource
persons in collaboration with the trained national
staff. A number of in-country workshops were conducted
to provide essential guidance and make required
assumptions after thorough discussions. The international
staff of the census project assisted in organizing
the workshops and coordinating follow-up activities.
The 4 database CD-ROMs with its software for data
retrieval and other statistical packages such
SPSS and People was used to assist the analysis
of census results. |
| Census Data Storage and
Dissemination |
| The final census tabulation, the final report, Village
Gazetteer, and various other analytical
reports such as Fertility and Mortality, Nuptiality,
Labour Force and Employment, Housing and Household
Amenities, Spatial Distribution and Migratory
Movement, Woman in Cambodia, Population Projection,
Literacy and Education are now available for the
public. |
| With help of technical consultant,
the data and information generated from the census
processing and analyses were repackaged into four
CD-ROM. These are: |
- Priority Tables.
This CD, first released in September 1999,
contains table sets consisting of 47 priority
tables at the following geographical levels:
Country (Total, Urban, Rural), 24 Provinces
(Total, Urban, Rural) and 180 Districts. In
all, there are some 11,000 cross-tables on
the CD covering the general population aspects.
The CD also includes a Table Retrieval Software.
- Village Databases.
A CD with a wide variety of aggregated data
for the 13,339 villages enumerated during
the Census. In total there are 6 individual
databases covering following topics: Number
of Households, Housing Amenities, Population
by Age and Sex, Literacy, School Attendance,
Educational Attainment, Marital Status and
Relationship to Heads of Households. The databases
are in DBF format; no supporting software
is made available for this product.
- Mapping and Graphing
Database. A CD with a POPMAP application
for Cambodia allowing data users to present
key census results by means of thematic maps
and graphs. POPMAP is a user-friendly mapping
software developed by the UN Statistical Division.
The application consists of detailed maps
for the Country, Provinces, Districts and
Communes. In addition, line layers are made
available for the main routes and rivers and
point layers for the villages and schools.
A large database of key census results with
123 different indicators down to the Commune
level forms the heart of the application.
- Population Database.
This product is build around census micro
data, i.e. a huge dataset of all person and
housing records. A database engine (REDATAM)
is made available for the Retrieval of Small
Area Statistics. With this product data users
themselves can easily create frequency and
cross tables for any conceivable geographical
level. The application allows selection down
to the village level.
|
| To further promote census results, a technical team
for census data dissemination was organized to
conduct workshops and make presentations on census
outputs and the 4 CD-ROMs for ministries and organizations
in Phnom Penh and at the 24 provinces and cities
of Cambodia, which was started in August 18, 2000
and finished on March 24, 2001. |
| NIS Web Site:The NIS web site (www.nis.gov.kh)
was launch in August 15, 2000. Its displays general
information about NIS and some recently generated
Cambodia statistics. An order form is also included
for the user to communicate for further information
and to request for publications. |
| Cambodia Socio-economic Survey (CSES99) 1999:
CSES 99 had used with interpenetrating
sub samples which allowed four sub samples and
global estimates could be prepared independently
for each sub-sample. The survey was conducted
2 rounds. So, data processing operation was also
conducted in two rounds. There were 14 manual
processing staff and 19 computer processing staff.
The vice bureau chief was assigned responsibility
of over all supervision of computer operation.
However, data entry program, editing programs
and tabulation programs were prepared by the project
experts. The processing system used network system
using 17 desktop computers with two servers. |
| The data entry was carried out using Integrated Micro
Computer Processing System (IMPS). One data file
was created for each household and ten files for
each village. The data entry system was developed
as stand alone stations and the computer could
be linked to the server used by supervisors after
data entry through Net-work environment. The Supervisors
were responsible for creating backup of all entry
files and merging 10 household files to create
one village file. This village file was used to
execute the errors which is passed to the data
entry operator to edit the data files. Once the
data file were error free, all households files
were merged to create one data file and that became
the full data file for all sample households.
Then the necessary sub-master files were created
with linking necessary variables. With the help
of those sub-masters the useful tabulations are
going to be produced. |
| 3.
Hardware and Software Resources Available at NIS |
| a- HARDWARE |
75 Microcomputers with
the following configuration:
- Microprocessor:
386, 486, and Pentium (65)
- Each computer has one
Floppy Drive (1.44 MB, 3.5")
- RAM ranging from 8MB
to 16MB, and 10 PC with 64MB RAM
- Hard Disk ranging from
100MB to 2GB, and 4 PC with 10 GB
- Some computers are equipped
with CD Rom
- VGA video adapter with
color monitor
|
3 Note book computers with the following configuration:
- Microprocessor: two with 80486, and one with
Pentium 166 MHz
|
3 HP color scanners
5 HP LaserJet printers
5 Epson LQ1170 printers |
| b- SOFTWARE |
+ DOS 6.0/Windows 3.1
+ Windows 95/98 |
+ Spreedsheet: Excel
+ Wordprocessor: Winword
+ Database: dBase, FoxBASE, FoxPro, Access, WinR+
+ Statistical Packages: SPSS, CLUSTER, IMPS, PC-EDIT
+ GIS System: PopMap |
| c. Computer Personnel |
| At present, there are about 60staffs who have some kind
of computer literacy and 20 of them are staff
of the Computer Center itself. Furthermore, three
officers are trained abroad on computer processing. |
| 4.
Problems and Recommendations: |
| Although NIS has gained some experiences and equipment
through projects, it still lacks skillful personnel
to handle data processing, analysis, and dissemination
operation on its own. Processing a multi-topic
survey like CSES 1997 or CSES 1999 with a complex
design is still not within the in-house capacity
of NIS. Developing a system and editing survey
questionnaires and extraction of complex tables
for analysis need advance knowledge of programming
and profound experience as well. NIS definitely
has to depend upon external assistance for some
years. Therefore, skill upgrading is still an
acute need of the institute. |
| Statistical activities have to be continued to retain
the manpower developed so far. More experiences
will sharpen the capability of processing and
keep the staff updated also. Unfortunately,
the Cambodian government can hardly afford to
conduct any larges scale surveys on its own fund.
Therefore, there is a severe scarcity of resources
to continue statistical activities. |
| Processing is a part of survey operation. To improve
processing capability, subject matter specialists
need also to be upgraded in different bureaus
of NIS along with computer center. |
| Cambodia may face difficulty in retaining the skilled
computer operators and supervisors of NIS due
to attractive incentives available in non-government
sector. It is time to be thought by NIS and higher
authorities on this problem. One of the ways to
retain manpower and keep the staff update is the
continuation of statistical activities at NIS.
Therefore, keeping in mind the lack of its own
resources and possibility of gap in external assistance,
NIS should try its best to coordinate donors in
arranging external assistance. In fact, NIS should
also put a feasible and plausible request to the
government for regular activities as well. |
|
| APPENDIX |
| Organization of the
Survey Planning & Implementation |
|
