ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) is all set to launch the country’s economic census main findings report, official sources told Business Recorder.
The main findings report is now finalised and will be launched in a formal ceremony by Ahsan Iqbal, Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives on Thursday (today). The event will bring together stakeholders from Federal and Provincial institutions, economic experts and development partners.
Sharing the details, sources said Pakistan Bureau of Statistics successfully conducted the 7th Population & Housing Census 2023 the country’s first-ever Digital Census the largest digitisation exercise in the region, engaging 250,000 personnel. This census geo-tagged almost 40 million structures, enumerated 250 million people across 20 demographic variables, and documented 38 million households.
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For the first time, PBS integrated questions on economic establishments covering type of activity (as per Pakistan Industrial Standard Classification) and employment numbers within the population census framework. This innovation saved the Government Rs. 7 billion and yielded a comprehensive database of 7.2 million establishments (including shops, factories, and institutions) to support evidence-based policymaking and economic planning.
The results of the 7th Population & Housing Census 2023 were approved with consensus on 5th August 2023 during 50th meeting of Council of Common Interest (CCI) and detailed demographic and housing results up to village level were disseminated publicly through website and reports on July 18, 2024.
In parallel, PBS initiated data cleaning of the Data collected for Economic census. Cleaning this large-scale dataset presented challenges due to variations in textual activity descriptions and industrial codes. PBS addressed these using rule-based algorithms, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and Large Language Models (LLM) in the field of Natural Language Processing (NLP), reflecting PBS has enhanced technical capacity in modem data processing and analysis.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025