Fiji Agriculture Census 2020
Fiji, 2020
Identification
FJI_2020_AC_v01_M_v01_A_ESS
Fiji Agriculture Census 2020
AC 2020
| Name | Country code |
|---|---|
| Fiji | FJI |
Agricultural Census [ag/census]
The Fiji Agriculture Census 2020 (AC 2020), to which data metadata and data presented here refer, is the seventh AC conducted in the country. Previous censuses were undertaken in 1950, 1960, 1968/1969, 1978/1979, 1991, and 2009. AC 2020 was conducted, for the first time, using complete enumeration marking a significant milestone in census data collection for agricultural statistics in the country. All previous agricultural censuses conducted in the country used sampling which limited generation of estimates of various characteristics at lower geographies.
The 2020 Fiji Agriculture Census provides comprehensive community-level data on farmers, farm communities, and agricultural operations. The census data is necessary for the development of evidence-based policymaking because it ensures that issues affecting agricultural livelihoods are systematically captured and integrated into national decision-making processes. Timely and reliable statistical information is crucial for the benefit of society and the economy as a whole as it supports economic and social planning, as well as providing valuable data and evidence for analysts, researchers, civil societies and the general public.
Census/enumeration data [cen]
Agricultural holdings
Scope
The census scope covered agricultural activities (crops and livestock production), aquaculture, fisheries, and forestry activities.
The farming households questionnaire collected data on:
- Household composition
- Housing particulars
- Land
- Crops on farmland
- Livestock
- Forestry
- Fishing
- Aquaculture
- Climate change and challenges
- Equipment
- Agriculture (crops, livestock, fisheries, forestry, sugar) services
- Food insecurity experience
- Labour
The institution questionnaire collected data on:
- Geographic location of the farm
- General characteristics of the farm
- Land
- Crops on farmland
- Livestock
- Equipment
- Employment
- Agriculture (crops, livestock, fisheries, forestry, sugar) services
Coverage
The census covered all rural areas and part of the peri-urban areas in the country. All farming households and institutions in assigned areas were fully enumerated. Institutions were schools, group-owned farming organizations, and large commercial farms that were not owned by households.
The statistical unit was the farm (agricultural holding), defined as an "economic unit" of agricultural production under single management comprising all livestock kept and all land used wholly or partly for agricultural production purposes, without regard to title, legal form, or size. Single management could be exercised by an individual or household, jointly by two or more individuals or households, by a clan or a village, or by a juridical person such as a corporation, cooperative or government agency.
For the Fiji Agriculture Census (FAC) 2020, data was collected from the following statistical units: Farming Households and Institutional Farms (Agricultural Holdings).
Producers and sponsors
| Name |
|---|
| Government of Fiji, Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) |
| Ministry of Fisheries |
| Fiji Bureau of Statistics |
| Ministry of Forestry |
| Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation |
| Name | Affiliation | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations | United Nations | technical support |
Sampling
The Fiji Agriculture Census 2020 used several sources for developing the sampling frame: the farming household baseline survey 2015-2016, the farmers listing (after review in 2018), the Population and Housing Census (PHC) 2017 locality data, boundary descriptions using satellite imagery and ground-truthing of the field descriptions.
The first ever list of farms established by the Ministry of Agriculture was undertaken in 2015/2016 and improved in 2018 because the coverage in 2015/2016 was incomplete due to the Tropical Cyclone Winston. Data from PHC 2017 was used to verify the coverage. The 2018 review of the farmers listing was performed at the village level in parallel with satellite imagery and ground-truthing of the field descriptions. The final frame of the Fiji Agriculture Census 2020 comprised 70 161 households.
The Fiji Agriculture Census 2020 was a complete enumeration of all holdings in the four sub-sectors of agriculture (crop, livestock, fisheries, and forestry) of the country.
Survey instrument
Two questionnaires were used for the Fiji Agriculture Census 2020 data collection: the farming households questionnaire and the institution questionnaire. Further, the census covered 21 items out of the 23 essential items recommended in the WCA 2020.
Data collection
| Start | End |
|---|---|
| 2020-02-10 | 2020-02-29 |
Reference day: 10 February 2020 for livestock, farming equipment inventory, number/area of plants or trees planted, and location of farmland parcels.
Reference period: from 10 February 2019 to 10 February 2020 for crops, area harvested, fertilizers and agricultural pesticides, labor force, etc. However, for better recall and accurate reporting, shorter reference periods were also included, and simple calculations were recommended to capture the last 12 months data such as milk production (over three months), fishing activities (over one month), farm gate price (recent sale), and household members (over six months). Climate change questions on changes observed, type of events occurred, and frequency of occurrence used a 10-year period (from March 2010).
- Face-to-face [f2f]
The Fiji Agriculture Census 2020 engaged 430 enumerators, 146 field supervisors who were existing locality extension officers, and 118 area coordinators (CAPI supervisors) who were existing senior technical extension officers that were trained and employed to collect, verify and scrutinize data collected during the census enumeration period.
The Headquarters Team consisted of ten statistics officers from five government agencies (Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Fisheries, Ministry of Forestry, Fiji Bureau of Statistics, Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation) who were members of the AC 2020 Technical Working Group. All data processing activity was carried out at the Main Census Data Processing Room by two staff of the Fiji Agriculture and Rural Statistics Unit with guidance from a consultant of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Two IT officers from the Ministry of Agriculture were responsible for coordinating IT activities at the three main regional census offices during the census period.
In the Fiji Agriculture Census 2020, data was collected using CAPI method using Survey Solution software on tablets for both household and institutional questionnaires. Satellite imagery was used for boundary description, which was followed by ground-truthing to verify the descriptions on the field. CAPI using tablets with GPS, was used during the data collection of the census. Census results were disseminated online. During the census operations, video-teleconferencing systems were also installed in all census regional centers for team briefing, communication, discussion, and updates.
QUALITY ASSURANCE
Data validation checks were incorporated into the CAPI method to help enumerators identify possible errors/outliers in the data reported. There were two types of validation checks: one for incorrect data and the other for data that might be wrong or inconsistent. In addition, field supervisors were assigned to all enumerators to provide agriculture technical advice and to provide last checks on all cases before the daily were sync.
Incomplete cases identified during the Fiji Agriculture Census 2020 data collection period, which resulted from the technical glitch, human errors, etc., were returned to enumerators for farm revisit and verification or rejected. Incomplete cases found after data processing were addressed using existing datasets such as 2018 farming household baseline data from Ministry of Agriculture and 2019 Village Profiles provided from the Ministry of iTaukei Affairs. Other alternative methods used were phone re-interviews and checks on the internal consistency of the variables collected in the household questionnaire.
Upon completion of fieldwork the data was exported in SPSS and several cleaning tasks were undertaken. All tasks were recorded, and data was modified using SPSS syntax files to ensure traceability and accuracy during the cleaning process. Editing activities consisted of:
- check of numeric question for outliers
- check for missing values: filled either through call back to respondents or automatic imputation, as appropriate
- recoding of other specific values
- locality corrections, using SPSS syntax
Regarding the cartography of the Fiji Agriculture Census 2020, the country was sub-divided into 197 Tikinas (Districts), that are the enumeration area (EA). Since the areas covered also included major residential subdivisions of the largest towns and cities, where the majority of households are engaged in non-agricultural activities, a demarcation was carried out to delineate a boundary within the peri-urban areas.
Each team was provided with district maps clearly outlined with the enumeration boundary, and each Field Supervisor had an enumerator listing form for daily coverage checks. A Post Enumeration Census (PEC) was undertaken during April 2020 to verify the quality of data collected. The farmers listing was considered as a baseline for PEC. The census coverage was verified at district level. Four teams conducted post-enumeration exercises at under-covered areas in the Central, Northern and Western Division. The areas were identified through comprehensive coverage analysis of the census' areas, the reviewed 2018 farmers listing, and the coverage map from Survey Solutions. Districts and localities with less than 70 percent coverage were selected and revisited during the post-enumeration exercise.
Data processing
In addition to ongoing case checks by staff, the data was downloaded from the server in SPSS format every day. An automated syntax was used to produce and distribute two key reports. The first was a daily monitoring report showing unfolding survey results on key metrics such as farmers, agricultural activities, number of land parcels, land tenure and size, count of key crops and area planted, etc. The second was a report of interviewers that was produced for quality control, monitoring the number of rejected cases and errors per interviewer. The Fiji Agriculture Census 2020 adopted SPSS software for data processing, of which manual statistical procedures were formulated to identify and replace missing values using the farmers' socio-economic database as well as phone calls to the households identified. Data processing activities such as data cleaning and clarification of some missing information took much longer than initially planned. Delays were due to prioritization of other activities on agriculture, COVID-19 and cyclones that hit Fiji during the period.
Contacts
| Name | Affiliation | |
|---|---|---|
| Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) | Government of Fiji | [email protected] |
Metadata production
DDI_FJI_2020_AC_v01_M_v01_A_ESS_FAO
| Name | Abbreviation | Affiliation | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ministry of Agriculture | MoA | Government of Fiji | Metadata producer |
| Statistics Division | ESS | Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations | Metadata adapted for FAM |