(i) develop a structure able to effectively manage the census planning and operational processes;
(ii) plan all the process that need to be considered in establishing a census; and
(iii) design control and monitoring processes.

The structure of the handbook reflects as closely as possible the census cycle. The initial chapters discuss management aspects concerning the planning and preparatory stages, followed by discussions on the operational stages (i.e. field operations and processing), dissemination of census results, and finally evaluation. The publication is also useful to those who need to plan surveys given the detailed description of the overall process of collecting, processing, and disseminating the data.