Talk:Census

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I think this section as a whole, although useful, contains too much information to be posted in the main article about census. I think it would be better to move this section to its own article for people that really need to know what is every country in the world doing. 190.103.77.181 (talk) 13:11, 14 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've moved to the list to Population and housing censuses by country. This article will now need some work to recover from the split, but it seems everyone agrees that it's something that had to be done. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 22:34, 10 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I wonder whether this page needs an edit linking to wikinews. There was much about the census on the Radio Four news tonight, saying that there were now a record number of people from outside the United Kingdom who were resident in the United Kingdom, and the number of people who had described themselves as Christians had fallen; although Wikipedia is not newspaper, these comments could still go in wikinews. ACEOREVIVED (talk) 20:40, 11 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Not here. This is a article about censuses in general, while these are very detailed facts arising out of one country's census conducted in a specific year. Inclusion of these facts on Wikipedia should rather be considered at Census in the United Kingdom or moreso United Kingdom Census 2011. Hwy43 (talk) 02:19, 12 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for reviewing for a C-Class rating. Any feedback on what needs to improve? My feeling is there needs to be work on the content in terms of things which aren't covered. If there are issues with the style or clarity of what is here, some explanation/pointers would be useful.Ca3tki (talk) 10:00, 21 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I think it has the right structure at this stage. I don't like the content of the initial part but that is partly because of some of this appearing elsewhere in the article. Any suggestions about the content or ordering of sections would be really useful. Ca3tki (talk) 22:24, 18 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The introduction havers about the subject. While it is important to allow that census is more general than people, in practice it is people we are talking about. My view is that we should get to that more directly but also remove some specific content from the introduction and introduce a new section much later about political issues. Ca3tki (talk) 16:40, 11 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It has been a while but I have made some amendments to the lead section. Ca3tki (talk) 15:55, 31 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

There are a number of contributions relying on terminology and examples specifically from the US. As there are separate pages for modern implementation and individual US censuses these are not relevant to this article and should be replaced with international conventions and appropriate citations.Ca3tki (talk) 15:54, 31 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

http://tools.wmflabs.org/bibleversefinder/?book=2%20Chronicles&verse=2:17&src=! (URL found in this article) does not work. Syced (talk) 16:12, 27 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The earliest Greek example appears to be legendary. There is a source for this, but in the free excerpt from the article it refers to a "legendary" king of Athens named Cecrops around 1600 BCE (apparently from Eusebius around 300 AD). This should either be marked as mythical or removed. The Egyptian example is also unsourced; considering the alleged date is before 3000 BCE, I would be surprised if this also isn't legendary.69.165.234.93 (talk) 23:24, 30 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

It is not obvious to me that a section on development is relevant to census in general. The aspiration that cesus data empowers local communities is laudable but not accurate. It also does not identify how census would do that where a sample survey does not. It makes more sense to me to role an aspect of development into the uses section. Ca3tki (talk) 14:56, 12 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This edit established the usage of the page as BC/AD. Kindly maintain it consistently pending a new consensus to the contrary. — LlywelynII 10:54, 2 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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What are census circles, mentioned under "Enumeration strategies"? Batternut (talk) 15:03, 20 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"In census circles" means amongst people who know about/work on censuses. "In...circles" is a fairly common phrase, but perhaps not one which is obvious to non-native speakers of English? Cordless Larry (talk) 18:01, 20 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, ho ho. I must confess I am a native English speaker, and am indeed familiar with the expression. My trouble was, I was looking for a explanation of "circles" as used in the Indian census, eg Circles in Dibrugarh District, Assam and, in the depths of my own head, expected that kind of usage here too. lmao. I suspect I shall have to ask at 2011 Census of India. Thanks... Batternut (talk) 19:34, 20 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Answering my own question, it seems that census circles are typically administration circles, tehsils (aka talukas) or similar. They may be grouped together into community development blocks (aka rural development blocks), sometimes one-to-one. Batternut (talk) 18:55, 28 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Most censuses conducted before the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century were for specific limited purposes (to tabulate the able-bodied adult male population which could be called up for military purposes, or most commonly for purposes of taxation, etc. etc.). These did not generally arrive at a single number representing the total population of a jurisdiction, since such wasn't necessary or even useful to their particular purposes. I think that the U.S. census of 1790 and the U.K. census of 1801 were among the first "censuses of the general population" (i.e. systematic overall headcounts) conducted over a wide geographical area... AnonMoos (talk) 00:03, 21 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I remember having heard a claim that an early census returned roughly half the number the ruler expected. He complained, "You statisticians have taken more from me than any enemy."

Might anyone following this article have a source for anything like that?

My attempts to find something like that on the web suggests that the report I remember having heard may have been complete fiction. Still, it's such a juicy quote, it would be great if I could find a reference for it.

Thanks, DavidMCEddy (talk) 17:31, 27 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 16 January 2020 and 27 February 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Peer reviewers: HelenBanegas.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 17:05, 16 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The 2020 US Census uses iPhone 8s carried by each NRFU enumerator, so the language of the paragraph in 'handheld computers' should be modified to reflect current realities.^[1]

MaynardClark (talk) 03:59, 18 August 2020 (UTC) [reply]

I haven't read the entire article, but I do see that the first paragraph under "Impact" in the section that talks about the effects of Covid-19 is taken word-for-word from its source with no quotation marks used. This [[1]] is the source; the verbiage comes from what is indicated as page 4. The plagiarism needs to be addressed. I am not in the position to do so at this time, so I am noting it in case someone else can get to it before I can. Thanks. – Kekki1978 ^{(talk ✉ | contribs ✎)} 13:50, 21 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The redirect Early European population has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 8 § Early European population until a consensus is reached. Steel1943 (talk) 01:36, 8 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The redirect Early European population statistics and censuses has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 8 § Early European population statistics and censuses until a consensus is reached. Steel1943 (talk) 01:42, 8 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The redirect 2000 South Korean Census has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 8 § 2000 South Korean Census until a consensus is reached. Steel1943 (talk) 03:40, 8 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

This may be spinning off to another page, but at this time, more than a sentence on COVID on the broad article for census is undue. Moving the content here.

128.250.0.174 (talk) 09:30, 15 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• What makes you think that the COVID pandemic deserves no more than a line? The removed section gave well-sourced and important information relating to the delays in Census worldwide. We can have another page linked in the sections, but the information on the current page is brief enough to not overwhelm the main topic of the page. As for the 'No Consensus' part, the onus is on you to prove through consensus that these multiple section blankings are necessary (see WP:NOBLANKING ). You have also made no attempt to replace the sections with any acceptable content.
  
• I am reverting the change again, and not reporting for WP:NOBLANK under WP:Vandalism assuming good faith. If you feel the revert is unreasonable, I request you to not engage in an WP:EDITWAR and instead open up a discussion on the WP:TEAHOUSE or any other forum you find appropriate for comments from other, experienced editors. Cheers! Kingsacrificer (talk) 06:29, 26 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Firstly, thanks Kingsacrificer for assuming good faith. I think you have confused a few things, for instance you reference onus, which states "The responsibility for achieving consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content." That would be you, and I will ask you to self-revert.

If I were to point to an acronym for why the COVID pandemic deserves no more than a line, WP:RECENTISM presents itself. But I don't really have to; the standard you describe ("the information on the current page is brief enough to not overwhelm the main topic of the page") is not the standard Wikipedia uses for determining if we include information. Rather, WP:PROPORTION tells us "An article should not give undue weight to minor aspects of its subject but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight proportional to its treatment in the body of reliable, published material on the subject." The sources used do not demonstrate that COVID is even a minor aspect to the topic of census, and they certainly do not justify multiple paragraphs. 103.87.254.62 (talk) 02:21, 3 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The sources used do not demonstrate that COVID is even a minor aspect to the topic of census, and they certainly do not justify multiple paragraphs.

I don't understand why you say this. The linked references clearly cover a lot about the state of Census during COVID. These are important bodies (especially UNFPA and CCSA) and hence I believe their analysis deserves a mention on the page.

I appreciate your point about WP:ONUS, but I want to open this up for WP:3O so instead of reverting, I would like to keep the content. In fact, I'm going to edit the paragraphs a little, so they are updated, before listing this section for third opinion. (I feel RfC may be the next step if consensus is not achieved) Kingsacrificer (talk) 16:55, 4 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have made some basic edits and added this for WP:3O here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Third_opinion#Active_disagreements Kingsacrificer (talk) 16:10, 5 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Same editor. I see no reason why organisations writing a lot on the impact of COVID on the census during COVID would mean we would allot so much text. Should we allocate 1/10th of the page on elections to COVID? Elderly care? Supply chains? An entire wiki, refracted through a two year pandemic. Your comment describing the volume of writing on census in COVID may justify the creation of a page on Census in COVID-19 (in my initial comment I wrote "This may be [worth] spinning off to another page"), but it does not demonstrate it is DUE for the high-level subject article. 49.183.93.101 (talk) 06:40, 6 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have taken a third opinion request for this page. I have made no previous edits on Census and have no known association with the editors involved in this discussion. The third opinion process is informal and I have no special powers or authority apart from being a fresh pair of eyes.

Before getting into this too deeply, I see two IP's and one registered user in the conversation. Technically 3O is only for disputes between two editors, so if both IPs are represent individual editors who are vested in the discussion, I cannot participate as a 3O volunteer. If IPs are the same editor, we can proceed without question. Xan747 (talk) 21:27, 5 October 2025 (UTC) [reply]

3O volunteer initial opinion This is an issue where no single policly provides a bright line resolution of the dispute.

Kingsacrificer's main argument is that the content they wish to include is "brief enough to not overwhelm the main topic of the page". As of the current version, the COVID-19 section comprises 273 of the 5,073 total words in the article, or just over 5%.

sameIP cites WP:PROPORTION, which redirects to the NPOV policy page. This policy is less about the ratios of distinct topics to the total size of an article and more about how much to represent differing views within the same distinct topic. That said the WP:DUE section of NPOV is commonly cited in disagreements over how much press a given subtopic should receive as a broad interpretation of the policy, and I am ok with that. sameIP also cites WP:RECENTISM as an argument against the COVID-19 section being so large as proposed. I don't find this to be a very compelling argument. Over five years on we have substantial historical perspective on the impacts of the pandemic across virtually every aspect of human society, which are still much discussed, and are unlikely to be forgotten within the next 50 years.

Ideally both editors can reach a compromise solution. My thoughts are that a main section devoted to the pandemic is questionable. Content from it may be a better fit in as a subsection of an existing major section. History is the first one which jumps out at me, even though its subsections are by country. A related idea is to integrate country-specific impacts of the pandemic those country sections. These need not be mutually-exclusive options.

Another idea is to rename the Boycotts section something along the lines of "Complications" or "Hinderances" and make Boycotts and COVID-19 subsections of those. This is a topic with room to grow. For example, political instability has notably prevented any meaningful census of the Afghan population in the modern era.

Next obvious compromise is trimming the content. I am not comfortable proposing an arbitrary percentage by which to trim the content. Editorial focus should be on specifics: what is the most relevant content in these sources for this article. So I will ask both editors to separately draft candidate content which aims to meet the other editor at some in-between point—I pointedly did not say "half-way"—and post it in the below subsections. Xan747 (talk) 21:08, 6 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Kingsacrificer first response: I believe the idea of combining Boycotts and Covid-19 as subsections is a good idea.

I feel that the following structure should be adopted

Main Section: Obstacles
|- Subheading: Boycotts : This should contain the exact text currently present in the Boycotts main section.
|- Subheading: COVID-19 : This should contain the exact text currently present in the COVID-19 main section.

Following this, I believe there is no reason to trim the content or create another draft. Kingsacrificer (talk) 09:45, 8 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @Kingsacrificer:, I am looking towards writing a draft with retrospective sources rather than prospective ones. Can we get a timeline of when you think you will be able to source these? sameIP 49.183.93.101 (talk) 09:18, 12 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'll try to create one in a few days. Kingsacrificer (talk) 11:32, 12 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks @Xan747: for taking the time to weigh in. I'm generally supportive of merging out content, although I would like to see clarification before I comment further. Over five years on we have substantial historical perspective on the impacts of the pandemic across virtually every aspect of human society, which are still much discussed, and are unlikely to be forgotten within the next 50 years. None of these "substantial historical perspectives" that are "still much discussed" are in the article, so I'm not sure where you get this from. The lack of evidence that they exist or exist at the scale described is why I have characterized this as WP:RECENTISM. This should be taken as a question of the composition of the literature and whether this is a dominant/significant topic to a discussion of census broadly. - sameIP128.250.0.175 (talk) 22:21, 8 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've had a look. It's difficult to find broad overviews of the topic as COVID is so recent (in publishing terms), but I've quickly found Statistics and Dynamics of Urban Populations: Empirical Results and Theoretical Approaches which speaks broadly to census. The book does not mention COVID. When (if) Routledge publishes a second edition of Censuses and Census Takers: A Global History, we may get a better sense of the relative importance of COVID to the overall history of the census, but skimming it I don't gain any insight as to how important COVID would be. 128.250.0.175 (talk) 22:44, 8 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

A textbook on general methodology is the probably not the place to look for a decent treatment of the pandemic's impact on census-taking, and certainly not the follow-on effects of same. Skimming a book published before the pandemic for evidence of how important the impacts of the pandemic might be on census-taking is definitely not the place to look. Xan747 (talk) 23:19, 8 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

My consultation of a book from before the pandemic was to see how much accounts of the history of census are weighted to contemporary society. I found that our article fucks it up, as almost all of the account was over the last 200 years, with census-taking history before that taken as background. I didn't get a good sense of emphasis within that 200 years. If I found most of the history was focused on post-WW2, I would have been more convinced that COVID content was due, but if I found it was focused on 2000+ years, I would have been less convinced.

As an analogy, my approach is guided by the principle that if I am writing an article on cinema and I want to ascertain Tarantino's importance to the subject, I look at texts on cinema to see how they place him, rather than piecing together his relative importance by consulting books on Tarantino (and every other director/screenwriter/actor/producer). Even if you disagree on my approach, I would still like to see what retrospective sources you reference in your 3O. 128.250.0.175 (talk) 00:11, 9 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Since this is @Kingsacrificer's baby, I'll let them dig up retrospective sources for this issue specifically (all of the sources they currently give are contemporary the height of the event). I get your point about Tarantino, which is a better argument than scanning pre-pandemic sources for how they might cover COVID impacts. The latter is a very clever retroactive WP:CRYSTAL, and my compliments to you for its novelty to me. At risk of WP:OTHERSTUFF, this isn't how Wikpedia gets written. What actually happens is editors stumble across something interesting, find it isn't covered in any article, and plops it into one. In my opinion, that process generally serves us well given the nature of the project--namely very little top-down editorial planning or other dicta apart from some notable projects to expand on topics that aren't in the typical interests of young white men from the United States, which demographic dominates our writing pool. So I will see your WP:RECENTISM and raise you Eventualism. I'll draw your particular attention to the mention of Inclusionism, to which I generally subscribe, albeit with rare fits of wholesale culling of very undue content. Just today I made a this argument in line with my general philosophy. To put it another way, sometimes the better way to bring a minor topic into balance with other subtopics is to add content to the other subtopics. Imagine what you might have accomplished if in the course of all your research you fixed this article's fuckups by doing just that as opposed to putting so much effort into bellyaching in talk about it. Just a thought. Xan747 (talk) 18:57, 9 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I would be interested in having a prolonged discussion of editor philosophies with you, although this is not the venue. I will only that sensible judgements of content inclusion/exclusion is exactly how Wikipedia is written — when I see in the news that Paul Politician visited a hospital to shakes hands and kiss babies, I make a judgement of how important it will be to his overall biography in the future while choosing to include or exclude. Is that me peering into my WP:CRYSTALBALL? Probably.

Anyway. I'll look forward to seeing what sources Kingsacrificer digs up. For now, my attention is elsewhere on and off Wikipedia, I may be able to look closer at some point. 103.87.254.62 (talk) 02:49, 10 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Works for me, until anon. Xan747 (talk) 02:53, 10 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ideally both editors would come to a mutually acceptable conclusion. Odds of that happening are looking increasingly slim, rasing the unpalatable possibility of me being the deciding !vote. For reference, this is the current version in the live article:

Impact

The UNFPA had predicted that the COVID-19 pandemic would threaten the successful conduct of censuses of population and housing in many countries through delays and interruptions leading to compromises in quality, or complete cancellation of census projects. Domestic and donor financing for censuses was diverted to address COVID-19 leaving censuses without crucial funds. Several countries chose to postpone their censuses as the UNFPA had recommended.^[1]

The pandemic also affected the planning and implementation of censuses of agriculture across the world. The extent of the impact varied according to what stage the censuses were at, ranging from planning (i.e. staffing, procurement, preparation of frames, questionnaires), fieldwork (field training and enumeration) or data processing/analysis stages. The census of agriculture's reference period is the agricultural year. Thus, a delay in any census activity proves critical and can result in a full year postponement of the enumeration if the agricultural season is missed.^[2][3][4][5]

Adaptation

The UNFPA requested a global effort to assure that even where a census was delayed, census planning and preparations were not cancelled, but continued in order to assure that implementation could proceed safely once the pandemic was under control. While new census methods, including online, register-based, and hybrid approaches were being used across the world, these demanded extensive planning and preconditions that could not be created at short notice. The low supply of personal protective equipment to protect against COVID-19 had immediate implications for conducting censuses in communities at risk of transmission. The UNFPA Procurement Office partnered with national agencies to explore new supply chains and resources.^[1]

It's not clear to me how much of this sameIP is willing to keep, and I am frustrated that they have not simply made that concrete by drafting a proposal as I had asked. All we know is that they might settle for a significant trim, but lean toward not mentioning it at all. I am similarly frustrated that Kingsacrificer sees no reason to make a trim despite another editor, however vaguely, expressing an opinion that this is too much content. Therefore I again ask both editors to proposed trimmed-down content, but this time I will make some suggestions.

The content could be more economical with its prose without giving up too much information. For example, the very first sentence doesn't need to tell us what UNFPA predicted. In fact, since the pandemic is in the past, we only need to state what actually happened, where, when, and why. (And on that note, it seems all the sources given are from 2020, which is a real weakness when there is likely much literature more current discussing this topic.)

As another example, the first sentence of the second graf could be cut down to The pandemic disrupted population and agriculture censuses globally. The next sentence can lose the extent of the impact varied according to what stage the censuses were at and simply enumerate the things which were affected: staffing, procurement, preparation of materials, fieldwork, and data analysis. The final two sentences over-explain the effect on agricultural censuses. It should suffice to say: Delayed annual agriculture censuses meant that critical information was unavailable until after growing season had already begun.

In the adaptation paragraph, the first sentence could be shortened to The UNFPA urged countries that had delayed or cancelled a census to continue preparing for one once the pandemic had abated. It could also be eliminated entirely since that is less an adaptation than developing new census methods, and finding new supply chains for protective equipment.

If only these suggestions are taken, the content can easily be cut by half, if not two-thirds, and not broken into separate subsections. Xan747 (talk) 18:20, 9 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Xan747 @sameIP please review Kingsacrificer (talk) 14:32, 16 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've read it but will withhold comment until IP has responded. Xan747 (talk) 21:32, 16 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Kingsacrificer: I am sincerely open to including some content on COVID in this article, to a greater extent than I was when I first removed the section. But these sources do not demonstrate that material is DUE. The only retrospective sources you give not from the midst of the pandemic are two news stories and a primary source draft (UNSD). Your other sources include a blogpost and an update from March 2020. It seems like you have decided that it is important this article has content on COVID, and are looking for sources to support that. This is not how Wikipedia articles are written — WP:CARTBEFORESOURCE, WP:BACKWARD, WP:SOURCESFIRST, so on. sameIP 128.250.0.174 (talk) 09:00, 17 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Do you have access to the Science article linked at the top of this section? That would be a good secondary source to use. Cordless Larry (talk) 15:33, 17 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Cordless Larry, I have access to it via Wikipedia Library[2], as should you. It supports much of @Kingsacrificer's draft above. Xan747 (talk) 19:28, 17 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I can't access the article Kingsacrificer (talk) 19:35, 17 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, your account isn't old enough. You need six months and 500 edits, the latter of which you've got covered. I found a preprint in the form of a .docx file, which interestingly includes reviewer comments. Xan747 (talk) 19:44, 17 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This is interesting indeed. Thanks for sharing. But is this citable? Kingsacrificer (talk) 14:09, 19 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Cite the actual paper, but post here in talk a snippet of the preprint content you used to support the claim. Then I'll compare that portion of the preprint to the actual paper to make sure there had been no change in meaning. Xan747 (talk) 15:36, 19 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

If you e-mail me, I'll send you a copy. Cordless Larry (talk) 07:07, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This book is another good source and is open access. Cordless Larry (talk) 15:37, 19 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

From the front matter:

Against the backdrop of controversy between instrumental and performative theoretical stances towards census taking, it analyses the historical trajectories and political implications of seemingly technical decisions made during the quantification process by focusing on the 2020 round of censuses, which have been particularly revealing as activities have been affected by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the ensuing containment policies.

Emphasis added. Xan747 (talk) 15:48, 19 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'm looking at these sources. It's taking me a bit too long. Thank you for your patience. Kingsacrificer (talk) 20:23, 26 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I am in no rush, take your time. Xan747 (talk) 23:42, 26 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@sameIP, Wikpedia policies are notorious for lending themselves abuses such as the double bind in which you've entangled Kingsacrificer. If you are sincerely open to including some COVID content in the article, I again invite you to draft what you are willing to include in the section provided above. Xan747 (talk) 19:35, 17 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'm aware of WP:FETCH and I'm trying to not bite. I've added some content to History#Modern based on the Science source for now. same Ip 49.183.93.101 (talk) 03:39, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've removed the draft source that was included in the previous draft. I don't see any reason to remove the others.

I haven't fully utilised the Open Access book source because I have a feeling this is slightly longer than it needs to be.

Please share your comments on the above draft. Kingsacrificer (talk) 21:23, 1 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Tagging @Xan747 @Cordless Larry and @sameIP in case you are not subscribed to the topics. Kingsacrificer (talk) 07:46, 4 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your work. Ideally, I'd like to see more use of the sources that look back on this period and less of ones published during it (e.g. the Castano one), with the latter used more selectively, but I still think this draft is an improvement on what we have at present. Cordless Larry (talk) 09:02, 5 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the ping. This draft is even longer than what we started with, the opposite direction of what sameIP is asking for. As in my previous comments, some trimming can be done without loss of information, e.g.:

The UNFPA requested a global effort to assure that even where a census was delayed, census planning and preparations were not cancelled, but continued in order to assure that implementation could proceed safely once the pandemic was under control.

Another example:

The census of agriculture's reference period is the agricultural year. Thus, a delay in any census activity proves critical and can result in a full year postponement of the enumeration if the agricultural season is missed.

Can be rewritten as:

Delays in censuses can result in critical data being unavailable for an entire agricultural year.

Stylistically, there are too many short paragraphs for my liking. A paragraph should only contain a single sentence if it has absolutely nothing to do with surrounding prose. For instance, the final sentence of the draft doesn't deserve the "bullet-point" emphasis it receives, and can be merged with the penultimate paragraph. The third paragraph of the Impacts section, which is only two sentences, can likewise be merged into the previous one since all of that is about UNFPA recommendations. Xan747 (talk) 18:57, 5 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have made the changes @Xan747

Information from the old sources is factual, not analytical. Do I really need to get rid of the source in that case? @Cordless Larry

Kingsacrificer (talk) 20:12, 5 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

My point about the sources is just that when you write something like "Over 80 countries reported that the census of agriculture activities were either delayed, postponed, or suspended" based on a source published part-way through the pandemic (November 2020), we don't know whether that number subsequently changed. Cordless Larry (talk) 22:29, 5 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That is fair. I will see if I can revise this particular line. Do I need to sort it out before we include it on the page? Kingsacrificer (talk) 08:04, 6 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Am I free to include this in the article then? Kingsacrificer (talk) 16:17, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have added this portion to the article Kingsacrificer (talk) 20:41, 26 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]