ABSTRACT
The collection of labour market information in South Africa changed radically with the advent of democracy in the 1990s. Statistics South Africa (Stats SA), then known as the Central Statistical Service, embarked on a strategy to meet the new statistical needs of the nation. This included the introduction of the annual October Household Survey (OHS) covering all areas of the country and incorporating a detailed labour market component. Prior to this, Stats SA’s labour market statistics were for decades the subject of contention and ridicule, as discussed by MERG (1993), Simkins (1994), and Standing, Sender, and Weeks (1996). The postapartheid population censuses conducted in 1996 and 2001 also included all areas of the country, 1 as did the Community Survey (CS) of 2007.
