The 2011 Census will not be held
The 2011 Census will not be held on 8 March 2011. Please see this page for more information.
The 2011 Census
The next census will be held on Tuesday, 8 March 2011. Every person in New Zealand will be asked to fill out a census form.
March is chosen for the census because most people are back from holidays and there is not much seasonal work that takes people away from their homes. The census is held on a Tuesday because people are statistically less likely to be out that night of the week.
Who gets counted?
Everybody in the country on census night, including babies and visitors, gets counted in the census. It's an official count or stocktake of the population. Statistics New Zealand puts together data and publishes the results in tables and reports. 2006 Census data is now available.
Why is the information gathered?
The census gathers information about the numbers of people, their age, family, schooling, jobs, and where people live. It is how we can get a full picture of what's really happening in our country, because everyone takes part.
Information from the census helps determine how billions of dollars of government funding is spent in the community. It is used to help make decisions about which services are needed and where they should be, such as hospitals, kōhanga reo, schools, roads, public transport, and recreational facilities. Information from the census is also used by councils, community groups, iwi, and businesses to plan for the future.
How is the census taken?
For the 2006 Census, New Zealand was divided into 22 areas then into 412 districts and 41,000 meshblocks. Each meshblock contained about 100 houses. Census forms were delivered to each house and picked up afterwards by a collector, or people could fill in and submit the census forms online.
Did you know?
- The census questionnaires were printed in both English and Māori/English.
- During the collection phase of the 2006 Census, 6,500 collectors delivered census forms to approximately 4.2 million people and 1.6 million dwellings.
- Approximately 5.1 million returned forms were scanned over 53 working days to get the forms ready for analysis.
- The 1945 Census reported that one-third of New Zealand's population took between 1–5 minutes to travel from home to work.
- In 1956, the census asked for the first time about refrigerators and electric washing machines in New Zealand households. Over 40 percent of New Zealanders did not have access to electric clothes-washing machines.