Kingdom’s General Authority for Statistics using high-tech system to mine and update Hajj data

MAKKAH: The General Authority for Statistics is using a comprehensive high-tech system to update the Hajj statistics program.
Four-hundred statisticians at six facilities in Makkah and three support centers in Madinah, Jeddah and Taif, work with a safe high-tech online network to provide the main centers in Makkah and Riyadh with an immediate flow of data.
Hajj data is updated every six hours through the Hajj interactive statistical map on the authority’s official website www.stats.gov.sa
The authority’s data technique agent, Khaled Al-Dalkan, said the authority is working on a regular and continuous basis to develop methods, approaches and programming techniques to collect, process, analyze and publish data to achieve comprehensive, immediate and credible information. The authority also uses high-tech techniques that help reduce the time and spatial dimensions that might hamper the speed of processing and publishing data.
He also talked about a new technique using software to collect data through an online form to keep track of the daily total number of Hajjis, classified by their nationalities, time and place of arrival and vehicle types. All statisticians in Makkah are trained to use the new techniques, he added.
Al-Dalkan stated that the authority designated a technical team to work around the clock which includes a support team, an analytic team, as well as a team specialized in developing data collection, and monitoring all remarks and demands of field teams.
He also said that an interactive map of Hajj statistics was added this year and that anyone can check number of pilgrims arriving in Makkah, with an update every sixhours.