Chilean 2012 Census Data Called Into Question

A report out today from Chile indicates that an external commission reviewing the 2012 census in Chile has concluded that the results are not reliable, that they should not be used for public policy purposes, and that the census (at least an abbreviated version) should be retaken in 2015. The Commission, whose report (in Spanish) can be viewed here, concluded that there was an unacceptably high overall coverage error (undercount) of 9.3 percent of the population. And in one out of five census areas, the undercount was as high as 20 percent. As you might expect, there are calls for the resignation of the director of the INE (National Statistical Institute). Until new census data are collected, the commission recommended using population projections prepared for the country by CELADE--the Population Division of the UN's Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), which is housed in Santiago, Chile.