Incident Reports

Confusing questionnaire hinders collection

2015-05-31

Bagmati, Kathmandu, Kathmandu, Ward 10

 The government may not get categorized data of the houses and sheds destroyed by the earthquake from the ongoing inspection as the two types have been lumped together in the questionnaire. Officials at the National Planning Commission (NPC) which is leading the initiative for data collection and the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) said putting both land and sheds under one heading will not help the relief distribution and reconstruction process as houses and sheds have not been separated. Another question being used for data collection does not separate houses owned by single families and several families living in one house.

Although CBS is the main agency for data collection for the government, its officials said that they were not consulted before it was asked to send a representative to gather information. The government has sent five-member teams to each district led by an NPC official and consisting of representatives from different ministries, an engineer, and a CBS employee. “If we had been consulted before the questionnaire was prepared, such mistakes would have not taken place,” said a CBS official. He said that if the data collection teams listed houses and sheds and houses containing single families and multiple families separately, a clearer picture of the earthquake damage could be put together. NPC member Swarnim Wagle said that the NPC was not fully involved in the preparation of the questionnaire. “Due to the urgency of the moment, the Cabinet reached a decision, and teams were mobilized through the Ministry of General Administration,” he said. “I have also heard such complaints from the CBS.” This exercise is different from the assessment being done by 23 teams under Post-Disaster Need Assessment (PDNA). As it is a more extensive data collection effort, it is expected to help the PDNA. 

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