COMPUTER BASED CENSUS MANAGEMENT SYSTEM A CASE STUDY OF NATIONAL POPULATION COMMISSION (NPC)

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Census has been a reliable exercise from time, from where government rely for decisionmaking, and aids for administration and planning. According to Robert M. Groves, 2010 Director of the United States Census Bureau;

Just like we cannot survive without roads and bridges, the country does not function well without an updated census to distribute funds to areas that most need them and to support community decisions and their own future.

The increasing complexity of modern life means a greater need to plan housing, schools, roads, transportation, and a vast range of social and economic requirement for nation. This cannot be done without a detailed count of the population. Census is being officially managed by some organizations or government, for example the National Population Commission NPC.

The installation of computer in these organizations or bodies that manages census information will assist not only in fastrecording information but also in solving certain problems, which cannot be easily resolved manually. The human resource of any enterprises are considered to be their most valuable assets, if they are properly harnessed and are well motivated to perform their assigned tasks in such a manner as to enhance the enterprises goals and objectives.

Therefore, adequate population records will provide all the necessary information that is associated with people, which include the size of the population, age structure, educational attainment, labour force and socioeconomic characteristics, unlike in the manual method which makes access to data and information very tedious. The integration of different databases so that these databases can be merged and processed together and mainly other reasons, prompted the researcher to develop software for this organization, National Population Commission NPC.

1.1 Background of the study

Census taking in Nigeria can be traced to have started from as far back as 1966 after the colonization of Lagos by our colonial masters. Since then, there have been several attempts to count Nigeria population. However, these censuses are characterized by some difficulties and deliberate and illminded attempts to inflate population figures; just in favour of one geopolitical zone or the other. This does not and cannot represent the nations image as regards to human population. As a result of this, the National Population Commission NPC was established using the Decree No. 23 of 1989.

1.2 Statement of the problem

There are many problems affecting the National Population Commission from maintaining a steady reliable figures and estimates. These are the more reasons, why the researcher embarked on this research;

inadequate manpower

1.3 Objectives of the Study

The objectives of this study are summarized as follows:

To develop computerized software that automatically stores and retrieves all information on human population.

To develop a reliable system that could be used in collecting data/information on human population.