A shortage of workers due to the country’s record-low unemployment rate is negatively impacting the Population and Housing Census which will miss its extended deadline of March 31.

To combat the problem the Government has increased the salaries of census takers by 100 percent to prevent them from walking.

This was revealed by the Minister of Finance, Dr. Nigel Clarke as he answered questions posed by the Opposition Spokesman on Finance, Julian Robinson during Wednesday’s sitting of the Standing Finance Committee that is examining the 2023/24 budget.

Blaming the delay in the census on the “tight job market” Clarke noted that various industries were competing for workers who were in short supply.

In his responses to Robinson, Clarke acknowledged that the Statistical Institute of Jamaica (STATIN) which conducts the census, was “having challenges”. The finance minister pointed out that while STATIN had targeted 7,000 workers, it was unable to recruit more than 4,000.

“With the 4,000 that have been enrolled at a point in time, there has been a fair degree of turnover in that person who has been trained have moved on,” Clarke told the committee.

“The nature of the challenge has to do with the tightness in the labor market and the availability of persons to fill that role. We have since responded with a significant upward adjustment in the fees to census takers …to try and compete in the labor market for the persons that are needed,” Clarke added.

“We increased the compensation for census takers by 100 percent just to compete in the labor market,” he revealed while explaining that census takers are paid per questionnaire and a separate fee for each completed household.

“Both those fees were doubled in response to the fact that attracting talent and people have been so difficult,” Clarke remarked.

Apart from doubling the salaries paid to census takers, STATIN has introduced additional modalities of data collection including electronic and other means.

The population and housing census which is conducted every 10 years was delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The last census was conducted in 2011 and should have been undertaken in 2021 but was delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It finally got underway in September 2022 with a December 31 completion. However, that deadline was extended to March 31, which will also be missed.