Gosaibi, Minister of Economy and Planning, will open state-of-the-art Media and Information Center (MIC) at Central Department of Statistics and Information (CDSI) here, Tuesday. The opening of MIC will offer impetus to the ongoing preparations for 4th National Census for Population and Housing scheduled to start on April 28, said Abdullatif Ibrahim Al-Khamees, MIC's Supervisor, CDSI. Al-Gosaibi will also evaluate the ongoing preparations and look into the future course of action for Saudi Arabia's national census, he said. Over 100 officials including CDSI staff and representatives from concerned census departments of six-member Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) will attend the inauguration ceremony. In this context Al-Khamees said the national census in Saudi Arabia will be conducted simultaneously with GCC countries. However GCC states will carry out a unified census with each country having its own population surveys but under a similar format. The CDSI has trained a staff of over 40,000 to carry out the 2010 census in the Kingdom, Al-Khamees said. “The Kingdom will share expertise with the census officials from respective GCC countries expected to be present at the MIC opening ceremony,” he said. Besides, he said the Riyadh-based GCC Secretariat General has set up technical and media committees to discuss and coordinate efforts if any on the technicalities of the census. He said the combined census will help GCC states to achieve a better understanding of the demographics of the region besides presenting the total population of the GCC states at the same time. The 4th National Census of Population and Housing will continue for a two-week period until May 12, he said. Saudi Arabia had conducted first official census in 1974 when the Kingdom's population was 7,009,466 people of whom Saudis were 6,218,361. The second census was conducted in 1992 that showed the total population 16,948,388 including 12,310,053 Saudis while in the third national census organized in 2004 the total population reached 22,678,262 people and the number of Saudis was 16,527,340.
