Markus Pauly joins expert group for Census 2031

Every census starts with people: where they live, how households are structured, where they work, and how they are housed. Turning that information into reliable statistics, however, is a complex methodological task – and Census 2031 offers an opportunity to further develop how Germany brings together and uses the information available for this purpose. Prof. Markus Pauly will help shape that process. The Federal Statistical Office has appointed a new Scientific Expert Group for Census 2031, consisting of nine scientific members who will advise on the methodological development of Germany’s next census over a five-year period.

A central aim of Census 2031 is to make even better use of information that is already available in administrative and statistical registers. Where suitable data already exist, they can contribute to producing census statistics without requiring the same information to be collected again from citizens. At the same time, new European requirements call for population and housing statistics to be provided more frequently and in greater detail.

Making effective use of these different data sources raises important  statistical questions. Records may be incomplete, information may differ across databases, and missing values need to be handled in a statistically sound way. Ensuring that the resulting figures remain reliable therefore requires robust methods for assessing data quality, combining information, and dealing with gaps.

These are among the questions the new expert group will address. Its remit includes the development of quality indicators, new survey methods and data sources, record linkage, the imputation of missing information, machine-learning methods, and the provision of geographically detailed data. The group will formulate recommendations to the Federal Statistical Office and receive updates on how these are implemented.

Markus Pauly leads the Chair of Mathematical Statistics and Applications in Industry at TU Dortmund University’s Department of Statistics and is a Principal Investigator at the Research Center Trustworthy Data Science and Security (RC Trust). His research on statistical methodology, incomplete data, imputation, inference, and machine learning connects directly with several of the methodological issues the expert group is expected to consider.

Census 2031 is intended to combine high-quality official statistics with an efficient use of existing information. Greater use of register data can help reduce the burden on respondents and public administration while maintaining high standards for data quality and statistical methodology.

The census provides basic information on Germany’s population, education, employment, household composition, and housing. Its population and housing figures form an important basis for decisions at federal, state, and local level. For Census 2031, Markus Pauly and the other eight scientific experts will contribute their methodological expertise to ensuring that these statistics remain reliable, informative, and fit for the growing demands placed on official statistics.