The State Duma adopted the law "On the All-Russian Census." It will begin
at 12:00 a.m. on the night of October 9-10, 2002.
It had long been necessary to hold the census. In the opinion of head of
the department for census and demographic statistics of the Russian State
Committee on Statistics Irina Zbarskaya, today Russia has extremely outdated
information on the composition and the size of the population. The previous
census was held in 1989 and the next one was scheduled for 1999. However,
meagre state funds at that time did not make it possible to hold it. Moreover,
the all-Russian census is quite a large- scale event, which requires 4
billion roubles and almost three years of preparations while the census
itself is held within just eight days.
Generally speaking, the census will make it possible to answer two questions:
the size and the composition of the population. The census is necessary
to obtain all social and demographic characteristics of the population.
As the preamble of the law says, the census "is the basic source of the
formation of federal information resources relating to the size and the
structure of the population, its spread across the Russian Federation,
combined with the social and economic characteristics, the national and
lingual composition of the population, its educational level." Subsequently,
these data will be used not only for short-term calculations and forecasts
but also for the formulation of the social policy of the state.
For example, today the census is the only source of information on the
national composition of Russia. Moreover, today there is actually no information
even about the family status of citizens. Apart from that, the questionnaire
includes information about gender, age, citizenship, the command of foreign
languages, education, the place of birth and residence. Apart from that,
information about housing conditions, the sources of incomes and occupation
will be an important aspect of the census.
The poll will be carried out in the Russian language. However, the law
also provides a possibility to poll citizens using the state languages
of national republics and the languages of indigenous small peoples.
Participation in the All-Russian census, which will now be held every
ten years, is "a public duty of the individual and citizen" under the law
on the census. Simultaneously, the law specially stipulates that the census
will be held with the observance of the citizen's rights and freedoms relating
to the inviolability of private life and housing.
Information received during the census may not be used for the purposes
of inflicting property and moral damage on polled citizens. Incidentally,
all collected information is considered to be confidential and is not subject
to public disclosure while its processing will be protected from unauthorised
access.