News: Ethiopia gears up for vital agricultural census with massive training initiative

Addis Abeba – In preparation for the second round of the National Agricultural Census, scheduled for the 2024/2025 fiscal year, the Ethiopian Statistics Service has announced that it is providing capacity-building training to over 43,000 professionals across 45 public universities.

This endeavor marks a significant milestone, occurring 25 years subsequent to the conduct of the first National Agricultural Census in Ethiopia.

Officials report that the Ethiopian Statistics Service has already made significant progress in preparing for the second agricultural census.

These efforts include the completion of training for trainers and the recruitment of supervisors.

In collaboration with the Ministry of Labor and Skills, the Service has also enlisted over 43,000 data collectors.

In an interview with state media, Abnet Awaz, Institutional Transformation Executive Officer at the Ethiopian Statistics Service, emphasized that the capacity-building training for data collectors, which commenced on 23 August, 2023, is a crucial element of the census preparation.

This training for data collectors and supervisors is planned to extend until 15 September, 2024.

Authorities indicate that the census will encompass a broad spectrum of agricultural data, including cultivated land, uncultivated land with potential for farming, livestock such as cattle, sheep, and goats, and a thorough enumeration of domestic animals.

Abnet highlighted the importance of the nationwide agricultural census, noting that it will furnish essential data for the government’s development initiatives and policy implementations.

This preparation follows the announcement by authorities in February 2024 regarding the government’s plans to conduct a long-awaited population and housing census, as well as an agriculture census, within the next three years.

Similar to the National Agricultural Census, the population and housing census has faced repeated delays due to escalating conflicts and instability across various regions.

Despite being scheduled every decade, it has been over 16 years since Ethiopia last conducted a population and housing census in 2007. AS