365,472 financial units excluded from Economic Census count: Survey
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A total of 365,472 financial units were excluded from the count of the Economic Census, according to a survey.
The Economic Census, conducted in 2024, had recorded over 11.88 million financial establishments, but a later Post Enumeration Check (PEC) revealed that the national Net Coverage Error ( NEC) were 2.95 per cent, meaning nearly 3.0 per cent of economic units were missed from the economic census count.
The Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) carried out this Post Enumeration Check (PEC) after the census.
The state-run organisation published the report at a dissemination seminar on Post Enumeration Check( PEC) of the Economic Census held in the BIDS conference room in Agargaon, Dhaka on Tuesday.
The event was presided over by professor Dr. A K Enamul Haque, Director General of BIDS, and the chief guest was Aleya Akter, Secretary of the Statistics and Informatics Division, Ministry of Panning.
The Special Guests were S M Shakil Akhter, Secretary, Planning Division, Ministry of Planning and Mohammed Mizanur Rahman, director general of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics( BBS).
The report was presented by Dr. Mohammad Yunus, research director at BIDS.
The report stated that the Economic Census data was collected from 87,629 economic areas across the country from December 10-26, 2024.
This time, data for the Post Enumeration Check( PEC) were collected from 352 areas from June 28 to July 10, 2025.
The report further mentioned that internationally, an error of up to 5 per cent between the main census and the PEC is considered acceptable.
However, the national NCE in this economic census was 2.95 per cent, which is satisfactory.
While presenting the report, Dr. Yunus said that the highest error occurred in the country's 11 City Corporation areas, at 5.99 per cent. The reason cited was that many establishment owners in the cities were uncooperative in providing information. The NEC at the Upazila level was 2.48 per cent, and in municipality areas, it was 2.33 percent.
The PEC findings also stated that out of the total error, the error in urban areas was 3.90 per cent, and in rural areas, it was 2.55 per cent. Looking at the divisional level, the highest number of the errors was in the Dhaka Division, and the lowest in the Sylhet Division.
The NCE in the Dhaka division stood at 4.19 per cent while it was 2.01 per cent in the Sylhet Division, as per the PEC findings.