Bhutan’s first national Economic Census will be conducted from this December until the end of January (for a period of two months) next year.
Over 50 enumerators will be involved in the Economic Census and cover all the business establishments operating within the country.
The Economic Census will serve as a foundation for the measurement of businesses and their economic impact, say the officials from the National Statistics Bureau (NSB).
Furthermore, such census is expected to help create an enabling environment for the development of a private sector. It will also provide policy makers with evidence based information for the formulation of better policies and other national documents.
“The report would cover the structure of the economy. How has it changed, whether there are more enterprises, businesses engaging in manufacturing sector and tertiary sector,” said Ugyen Norbu, Chief of Economic and Environment Statistics Division under NSB.
Currently, Bhutan’s Gross Domestic Product or GDP is complied and calculated annually based on the administrative data.
So, the census report will help validate the administrative data and analyse the structure of the economy.
The final report on Economic Census will be published in May next year. The NSB with financial and technical support from World Bank will conduct the census.
