Tuesday, March 28, 2006

ArcGIS compatible data (preferably polygons) of municipal boundaries / urban landcover for Southern Vancouver Island

Question

A student is requesting the following data file:
"ArcGIS compatible data (preferably polygons) of municipal boundaries / urban landcover for Southern Vancouver Island".

Where can relevant data be found?

Answer

Check out the FTP site under the folder "geography," select 2001 and then spatial. There one can find all the mapinfo and arcinfo files for GIS.

The files are organised by level of geography - assess which best suits the student's needs. If additional levels of geography are required, but not found in the folder, they are likely not part of the DLI collection.

Friday, March 24, 2006

Travel Activity and Motivation Survey

Question

Will the Travel Activity and Motivation Survey be made available through the DLI?

Answer

We verified with the author division and the Travel Activity and Motivation Survey was never released as a public use microdata file - unfortunately.

Wednesday, March 22, 2006

Block-Face Data Files

Question

Our specialist in urban transportation has always used the ASCII Block-face Data Files in preparing his files for his research projects. He is now asking about Census 2001.

So the questions are as follows:
1. Was such a file produced for 2001?
2. What is the substitute?

Answer

The DLI does not have access to this level of data. A custom extraction can be purchased however.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Aboriginal labour force data

Question

A student is looking for annual data (1995 to 2005) on unemployment and employment rates for off-reserve and on-reserve
Aboriginal Peoples in the Wood Buffalo-Cold Lake Economic Region.

She also needs on-reserve unemployment and employment rate data for the Cold Lake First Nations - Cold Lake 149, 149A, 149B
Reserve, annual rates from 1995-2005. The data we've been able to find is from the 2001 Census.

Answer

The Labour Force Survey (LFS) does not collect information specifically for Aboriginal persons. As you know, the LFS has a sample of only ca. 50,000 households and only covers the provinces in Canada. The Canadian Territories are excluded from the sampling universe as are persons residing on Indian reserves.

The best option for your user is to use data from the 1996 and 2001 Census of population.

LFS 1999

Question

I note that there are two SPSS syntax files for this year's rebased Labour Force Survey data: one for the period Jan-Oct, and another for Nov-Dec. Since my aim is to create a single annual file, what would be the best way to do this? Is it, in fact, possible?

Answer

The reason that there are 2 SPSS syntac files for LFS 1999 is because part way through the year they changed the code values for the marital status variable. Here is what they did:

lfs-rebased2001-jan-oct-1999.sps

/MARSTAT
1 "Married or common-law"
2 "Single, never married"
3 "Widowed"
4 "Separated/divorced"

================================

lfs-rebased2001-nov-dec-1999.sps

/MARSTAT
1 "Married"
2 "Living in common-law"
3 "Widowed"
4 "Separated"
5 "Divorced"
6 "Single, never married"

Now if users want to have a single SPSS syntax for an annual file they will have to create come kind of new derived variable for the MARSTAT variable. This can be done by recoding the nov-dec MARSTAT data to match the MARSTAT Jan-Oct data

For example the logic is something along these lines:

For NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER

IF MARSTAT = 1 OR 2 THEN NEW MARSTAT = 1
IF MARSTAT = 6 THEN NEW MARSTAT = 2
IF MARSTAT = 3 THEN NEWMARSTAT = 3
IF MARSTAT = 4 OR 5 THEN NEW MARSTAT = 4

Once this re-code has been done then all the months can be put into an annual file and all will have the same MARSTAT codes. Please note that any analysis may not match published results as the more detail codes will have been lost.

Help with interpreting exported data from GeoSuite

Question

I have exported some date from GeoSuite at the Block level for all the blocks within DA 59290066. There is a field in there for UARA, which I assume is Urban Area/Rural Area. The data for this field mystifies me. I seem to get one of two values for these 48 blocks: 9959 or 316. Does anyone know what these figures mean? I have been through the GeoSuite Reference Guide, and it has not been a help.

Answer

The codes 9959 and 316 correspond to the the geographic codes for the urban/rural areas for British Columbia Rural Area and Gibsons (respectively).

You can perform a search for these codes using the "Code search feature" and selecting UA/RA as the level of geography. They are not population counts - they are simply the codes which identify the regions in the greater hierarchy of geographies.

Monday, March 20, 2006

Frost-free days and temperatures

Question

I have a master's student looking for the following information, does anyone know where I might find this?

"I am looking for either frost free days or growing degree days data for each census division in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. Is this data readily available? If this is not readily available, is it easy to obtain the daily max and min temperatures for April, May, June, and July for these geographic regions?"

Answers

1. I'm not sure if the data is presented at the CD levels, but for Alberta see the following:
http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/sag6278

2. You can get the climate normals data (which include the kind of information the student is looking for) from
http://www.climate.weatheroffice.ec.gc.ca/climate_normals/index_e.html

The data are arranged by province and weather station, so the student will have to hope there is one in each CD; if more than one, pick the one most representative. Some of the stations don't have all the available data elements, but with luck the student
should be able to get what he/she wants from here.

3. http://sis.agr.gc.ca/cansis/nsdb/ecostrat/district/climate.html

Thursday, March 16, 2006

Missing census tract

Question

Students in an urban geography course are interested in studying Montreal's small "Chinatown" district. It occupies portions of CT's 55-56-57. When we look at the CT level data for population, all of these census tracts have available data. We have looked under a number of other BST's however (immigration, mother tongue, housing) and CT56 is not there. Is there a source from which we could determine why the data is unavailable?

Answer

The division provided the following explanation:

CT - 56
1) The Data quality index for the 2A (short form) questions and the global non-response rate is higher than or equal to 5% but lower than 10%. This means that the data based on the 100% level (2A Data) is not suppressed.

2) The Data quality index for the 2B (long form) questions and the global non-response rate is higher than or equal to 25%. This means that the data based on the 20% level (2B Sample Data) is suppressed.

For 2001 only in cases where geographic areas have a non-response rate higher than or equal to 25% are the areas suppressed.

An additional document will be on the FTP site highlighting the ˜Data Quality and Confidentiality Standards andGuidelines" (FTP: dli/census/2001/Quality-Index).

Census 2001 Pumf re-release & re-issue

Question

The August version of the PUMF of Individuals is still available on the DLI FTP site. Is there a revised release date for the version that will fix the problem with INCSTP?

Answer

The release dates for the Census PUMF have been postponed, there are no new dates planned for the release of this product but they are working on coming up with a new release date in the next couple of weeks.

1986 FED

Question

A student needs FED profile data from the 1986 census for the FED boundaries set in 1987. This is for FEDs in the Census Division of Toronto.

The print volumes from the 1986 census are for the 1976 R.O. and the CD-ROM does not have FED data on it (and it would probably be for 1976 R.O. anyway).

If anyone has access to this data either in print or electronically or if it could be made available via DLI?

The other thought I had was to compare FED boundaries for 1976 RO and 1987 RO for Toronto CD and see how extensive the changes were. Stat Can DLI ftp site has one boundary file under 1986 census FED but it does not state what RO it is. I did download it and U. of T's 1987 RO file and they looked to be identical for Toronto.

Need confirmation as to the RO of the 1986 boundary file on the DLI site if possible.

Answer

The data that was published in 1986 was based on the 1976 FED Representation Order boundaries.

Free Electronic Publications

As of April 24, 2006, all electronic publications available on the Statistics Canada website will become free of charge. The purpose of this message is to inform you about this change in the Agency's publishing model.

The New Publishing Model has two components:

The free dissemination of all electronic publications on our website;
priced publications released on paper.

The adoption of the New Publishing Model supports the longstanding principles underlying the Agency̢۪s dissemination program: to make information of broad public interest widely available to the Canadian public but to charge individual clients for special products and services where the benefits do not accrue to the public at large and where additional costs are incurred by the Agency in providing them.

The move to free electronic publications will increase consistency in our priced publication program and improve access to our published information for users, respondents and stakeholders.

Under Statistics Canada's New Publishing Model, all electronic publications (PDF and HTML) on Statistics Canada̢۪s Internet site will be available for free as of April 24, 2006.

Electronic products that require a manual intervention by Statistics Canada staff (e.g. CD-ROM, files which have to be mailed, e-mailed or faxed to clients), database services (CANSIM, Canadian International Merchandise Trade database), and other priced datasets available on the Internet will continue to be priced.

Under the New Publishing Model, the Agency̢۪s ongoing print publication program will comprise a select group of publications, of a compendia or reference nature, which will enhance the visibility of Statistics Canada and profile the range of information that the Agency makes available. Statistics Canada will continue to charge for print publications in order to recover the printing, distribution and promotion costs.

The list of publications that will be part of the Agency̢۪s print publication program will be established in discussion with author divisions over the next few months. This new print publication program will be maintained as long as it continues to meet client information needs and is able to recover the costs for these titles overall without a corporate subsidy.

Users may purchase print-on-demand service for PDF publications available on the website.

****************
À partir du 24 avril 2006, toutes les publications électroniques disponibles sur le site Web de Statistique Canada seront gratuites. Ce message vise à vous informer des changements ainsi apportés au modèle d'édition en place au Bureau.

Le Nouveau modèle d’édition compte deux composantes :

la diffusion gratuite de toutes les publications électroniques sur notre site Web;
les publications tarifées en format imprimé.

L'adoption du Nouveau modèle d’édition soutient les principes qui guident depuis longtemps le programme de diffusion du Bureau : offrir gratuitement au public canadien de l’information d’intérêt général et recouvrer les coûts des produits et services d’information spécialisée, quand ces services visent à répondre à des besoins particuliers et que des coûts s'y rattachent.

Les publications électroniques gratuites

La transition aux publications électroniques gratuites augmentera la cohérence du programme de publications tarifées et donnera aux utilisateurs, aux répondants et aux intervenants un plus grand accès à l'information que nous publions.


Selon le Nouveau modèle d'édition de Statistique Canada, toutes les publications électroniques (PDF et HTML) qui sont sur le site Internet de Statistique Canada seront disponibles gratuitement à partir du 24 avril 2006.

Nous continuerons d'appliquer un prix aux produits électroniques qui nécessitent une intervention manuelle du personnel de Statistique Canada (p. ex., les CD-ROM, les fichiers qui doivent être envoyés aux clients par la poste, par courriel ou par télécopieur), aux services de bases de données (CANSIM et Commerce international canadien de marchandises), ainsi qu'aux autres ensembles de données tarifés qui sont déjà sur le site Internet.

Publications imprimées payantes

Selon le Nouveau modèle d’édition, le programme de publications imprimées du Bureau sera composé d’un groupe choisi de publications — compendium ou ouvrages de référence — qui contribueront à accroître la visibilité de Statistique Canada et qui seront le reflet du vaste éventail d’information diffusée par le Bureau. Statistique Canada continuera de vendre les publications imprimées afin de recouvrer les coûts d’imprimerie, de distribution et de promotion.

La liste des publications qui seront comprises dans le programme de publications imprimées du Bureau sera établie au cours des prochains mois, en consultation avec les divisions auteures. Ce nouveau programme de publications imprimées demeurera en place tant qu’il continuera de répondre aux besoins en information des clients et qu’il parviendra à recouvrer les coûts de ces publications sans l’apport de subventions du Bureau.

Les utilisateurs peuvent aussi payer pour obtenir le service d'impression sur demande pour les publications en format PDF disponibles sur notre site Web.

Canadian Business Patterns

Please note the updated products listed below and the path to access it via the FTP and web sites .

Canadian Business Patterns December 2005

FTP: /dli/cbp/2005/cbp2005-dec.zip

WEB: http://www.statcan.ca/english/Dli/Data/Ftp/cbp.htm

Recent figures, by CMA: for hairstyling and food and beverage serving occupations

Question

A patron is requesting an "updated figure on the number of persons in the CMA working in hairstyling and food and beverage serving occupations". The patron asks:

"Last time I checked there were 900 stylists and 3600 food and beverage servers - this was in 1998. Can you give me some direction for getting the most recent figures?"

Is CANSIM II a tool that will provide the desired figures? CANSIM II attempts found Labour Force Survey (LFS) tabulations by CMA and NOC-S, but, if I am doing this correctly, the tables only present counts at what appears to be a fairly high NOC-S level.

For example: CANSIM II Table 2820059 provides LFS estimates by CMA and NOC-S, with V2102135, for example, listing figures for "Sales and Services Occupations" in Halifax. These figures appear (?) to be for the NOC-S "G9" classification G9 (Sales and Service Occupations n.e.c.).

How do I access recent CMA level data for the G911 (Hairstylists) and G513 (Food and Beverage Servers) classifications? (Assuming this is the correct way to reformulate the patron's request?)

Answers

1. The best source that I know of for occupation counts at such a detailed level is from the Census. Perhaps someone else will have another suggestion, but for now, you can follow these steps to access occupation counts from the Census:

1) Visit www.statcan.ca and continue in English
2) Click on the 'Census' button at from the top black and blue menu
3) Use the left navigation bar and click on "Data"
4) From the main body of the page, click on "Topic-based Tabulations"
5) Click on "# 18 - Earnings of Canadians"
6) Review tables 9, 26 or 29

2. One alternative is to use the 2001 census table of detailed occupations, such as 97f0012xcb2001021 (2001 NOC with 532 categories) or 97f0012xcb2001017 (2001 NOC with 720 categories). Both tables include CMA-level geography.

Another, even more up-to-date, alternative is to use the Canadian business patterns file, at the CMA level, for the number of persons working in appropriate industries. In the June 2005 file with 6-digit NAICS classification (932 categories), there are: 6 different categories of food and beverage sales and service, and three different categories of hair care, including:
812114 - barber shops
812115 - beauty salons
812116 - unisex hair salons

Thursday, March 9, 2006

NAICS and SICs

Question

(1) Is the 1991 industry data is available at the CSD level by 1997 NAICS codes
(2) Is the 2001 industry data is available at the CSD level by 1980 SIC codes

I had a look at the information on this webpage and the following paragraph makes me think that it's probably "not available" for Question #1 (although it does suggest the workaround of using the LFS data) and "possibly available" for Question #2. Therefore, if "possibly available" - where might that be accessed and hopefully it's not a custom order?

Hence, we can conclude that the conversion to NAICS97 in 2001 will cause a break in the census time series. To accommodate the data requirements of users of historical census data, the 2001 industry write-in responses were coded separately to the NAICS97 and the SIC80. Since the census does not plan to undertake any historical reconstruction of previously released data, it is recommended that comparable data -- such as data from the Labour Force Survey -- be used as a proxy for NAICS97-based distributions of census labour force data prior to 2001.

Answer

Neither 1 or 2 are possible through the DLI according to the Census Help Desk. The only real alternative is to have 1980 SIC by CSD for 2001, but this would be at a cost.

Sudanese in Winnipeg

Question

A student wants information on the Sudanese population of Winnipeg. It looks to me like this info is not available on the Statcan Web or via DLI. Is there some other source that I should know about?

The only files found don't go further than CA or CMA.

Answer

I am assuming that you are looking for data for the Census Subdivision (CSD) of Winnipeg and not the Census Metropolitan Area.

Data at the CSD level include:

Visible Minority (within the Ethnocultural Portrait of Canada Module), Aggregated Place of birth (would not allow you to identify Sudanese - in the Immigration and Citizenship module)

Simply put, the closest data your patron will find is at the CMA geography level of Winnipeg. All of the data found at the CSD is too aggregated and does not meet his needs (does not identify Sudanese persons).

Try to convince your patron to use CMA data - otherwise, I think something can be created at a fee (custom tabulation).

Life expectancy by age and province

Question

I have a faculty member looking for data for life expectancy if one is a given age and also by province. For example, how long would a male, age 65 be expected to live by province. Is this the same age if a male is 40?

Do the Life expectancy tables provide this information? I wasn't sure how to read them.

Answer
There is a great table in CANSIM - table number 102-0218 - Life expectancy - abridged life table, by age group and sex, three-year average, Canada, provinces, territories, health regions and peer groups, occasional (Years). It is also in E-Stat.

The most recent year is 2001, but it does break down the life expectancy by individual age and province.

CANSIM 153-0037

Question

A student is trying to access Table 153-0037 via CANSIM at E-STAT. I can identify it when searching CANSIM from the StatsCan page, but of course at this point it wants me to pay. When I try the search in E-STAT/CANSIM, it claims the table does not exist.

I can get find the table using the CHASS interface but then I have that very long list of vector numbers to work through which is why I would prefer to use the E-STAT interface. Why is it telling me that it doesn't exist?

B.t.w., as we both searched for the table by means of the E-STAT/CANSIM subject approach, we didn't get the same number of tables. She got 75 and I got 73. The table she is looking for is in her list of 75 and is not in mine of 73. The search was Population and Demography; Population Characteristics. Does this make sense to anyone?

Answers and Responses

1. Something is very strange because when I used E-Stat, and performed a search for table # 153-0037, it came up. Then I tested it on another computer and it did not come up. Then I retested on my computer and it no longer comes up.

2. I have checked a few of the series in the CHASS version of 153-0037, and so far, all were update on Dec. 14, 2005. The E-stat edition of CANSIM was last updated July 4, 2005, hence the discrepancy. I would suggest using the STC CANSIM interface to identify the vector numbers (Vnnnnnnn) of the series you need, and then retrieving them via the CHASS interface.

3. The table is definitely a new one. Take a look at http://cansim2.statcan.ca/CII/Communique/2005121420463_E.htm. Under "Environment Accounts and Statistics Division" there is an announcement of new tables for drainage areas in Canada and 153-0037 is one of them.

CT-level Census data for 1961, 1971, and 1981

Question

REQUEST to add CT-level Census data for 1961, 1971, and 1981 to E-STAT.

A Faculty Member in our History Department is looking for an effective, straight forward, non-time consuming, and uncomplicated way, for his upper year undergrad history students (Historical Research Methods), to have access to the historical census data in geographic contexts. Here is an excerpt from the Prof's email to me:

"I am a professor in the history department, and I would like to use historical census data for a methods class that I will be teaching and research next semester. I would like students to be able to select variables and download their own census tables for analysis. I was hoping to use data with geographic specificity, particularly the tract-level data that is available to our students via the CHASS server at the University of Toronto (Canadian Census Analyzer). Unfortunately, the [historical] data available through CHASS are not readily readable in SPSS, the software that I would like students to use. Instead, the command files are missing important information (likely they are quite old) and they generate files that need a good deal of processing before they can be used. Do you know whether we can access this same data through some other service? "

In subsequent, very helpful, discussions with Chuck Humphrey, this idea came forward: "... a request could be made of E-STAT to add CT-level Census data for 1961, 1971, and 1981. "

How best to submit this request? Would there be general support/interest, in the DLI community, regarding this E-STAT development request?

Answers and Responses

1. Thank you for the excellent suggestion. We are aware this data is missing from E-STAT and we are looking at this matter. We will let you know of our decision. Do not hesitate to contact the Learning Resources team (education@statcan.ca) should you have any questions.

2. First of all, I should clarify that the Census profile files that are available via the CHASS interface for the 1961 and 1971 Censuses are not Stats Can products at all.

One of our graduate students here at UT took and aggregated the 1961 from the EA-level basic summary tables, and produced the files that are available in the CHASS interface. For 1961, the file is not strictly speaking a profile file, but is all characteristics that were in the original 1961 EA-level files, with the exception of any averages (means, medians, etc) that we could not recreate from the original EA files, because we lacked either the numerator, the denominator, or both in those files. However, since these files for the most part are either uni- or at most bi-variate distributions, we decided that they were more profile-like than not. We have done some spot checking to make sure we were getting the same numbers as the print profiles, but have checked by no means all of the CTs in Canada.

For the 1971 profile file, we extracted from the many 1971 CT-level basic summary tapes those characteristics that most closely approximated the print profile product from that census. Like with 1971, we did some spot checking against the print publications, but nothing like a comprehensive check. One or two variables we would have liked to include we had to drop because we couldn̢۪t recreate what was in the print publications for them (housing value was I believe one of them).

In other words, for those two profile files, Statistics Canada may be the author of the content, but UofT Data Library Service is responsible for the edition. Whether it is appropriate for STC to put these into E-stat, or instead recreate the work we did and produce their own editions of these profiles, is a question on which there might be several points of view.

The 1981 census profile was the first machine-readable census profile file that I am aware of Statistics Canada having produced. I see no problems therefore in STC putting those profiles in E-stat.

NOC and SOC concordance

Question

Request for the concordance table between the NOC 2001 and the SOC 1991. This table is not available through the FTP site. Any chance that it could be made available through DLI?

Answer

If you have access to the print publication â€Å“National Occupational Classification for Statistics 2001″ (catalogue number 12-583-XPE). It is a print volume, but has the concordance tables at the end (starting on page 669) for SOC 1991 and NOC 2001. The Excel files are also now available on the FTP : dli/standard_classifications/concordance.

Birth Weight and Income

Question

A patron is looking for statistics on low birth weight and low income families. I was able to pull a few things out of the Health Reports - does anyone have any further suggestions?

Answer

You could try the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth. This survey, which has several parts, has variables dealing with Birth Weight and Income. For example:

Income distribution:
National Longitudinal Survey of Children - Cycle 1 - Rel 2 - Primary File - 1996
AINHD01A - Recoded household income
Missing Values: 96, 98, 99
Value Label
1 Less than 10 - 000
2 10 - 000 to 14 - 999
3 15 - 000 to 19 - 999
4 20 - 000 to 29 - 999
5 30 - 000 to 39 - 999
6 40 - 000 or more
96 M NOT APPLICABLE
97 DON'T KNOW
98 M REFUSAL
99 M NOT STATED

There is a variable dealing with LICO ratios… (below, unweighted). It appears that the other Low Income variables are suppressed on this dataset. This file also has a Birth Weight question.

I found these variables by searching for keywords (birth weight) in the question text database at URL: http://db.library.queensu.ca/allvars/

Block face files for 2001 census - Victoria CMA

Question

Could you please confirm if the requested files are available through the DLI, and if not, redirect me to whomever I need to contact to acquire these files.

An honours student needs the block face boundary files for Victoria CMA 59935, described below:
http://www12.statcan.ca/english/census01/Products/Reference/dict/geo003.htm

We think they're not available through DLI, but could you check please, and if they're not DLI files, find out how much it would cost to purchase this CMA from StatsCan?

Answers and Responses

1. Block-level spatial data is not available through the DLI. It would be a custom request for which the user would pay.

2. It is my understanding that the Road network files for the 2001 census do in fact contain block level boundaries and metadata, and are in fact available thru DLI. The Victoria file is grnf99325r02[a|m]_e.exe, depending on whether you want the Arcinfo or Mapinfo format.

3. There is also the The Road Network File (RNF), 2005. The road to follow is
http://geodepot.statcan.ca/Diss/2006Dissemination/Data/FRR_RNF_e.cfm

4. Regarding the 2005 RNF, see
http://www.statcan.ca/english/freepub/92-500-GIE/2005001/how.htm.

Specifically:
"This product contains one layer of geographic information: road arcs with name, type, direction, class, and address ranges." and
"A polygon layer with Block identifiers is not provided with the 2005 RNF."

If I am interpreting this correctly, while the 2001 RNF may have included a Block Boundary File, this does not seem to be the case with the 2005 RNF.

5. The 2001 RNF does contain a separate polygon layer that are the blocks. There is no block-face level information in the RNF and there are no such thing as block-face boundaries.

The definition of block-face, block and dissemination are from the RNF Guide are below. BFUIDs and attributes are confidential and normally only used in Geography Division and for custom area creation by Geographic Services Consultants in the Regions.

I would strongly recommend the student consider utilizing blocks as the smallest geographic level for her work. And, if she plans to try to aggregate data, she needs to be aware that blocks will cause her distress as the only data available for blocks are the population and dwelling counts. The DA level of geography may be a better choice.

—-

Block
A block is an area bounded on all sides by roads and/or boundaries of standard geographic areas. Blocks cover all the territory of Canada. The block is the smallest geographic area for which population and dwelling counts are disseminated.

Block-face
A block-face is one side of a street between two consecutive features intersecting that street. The features can be other streets, boundaries of standard geographic areas, or limits of map tiles. Block-faces are used for generating block-face representative points, which in turn are used for geocoding and census data extraction when the street and address information is available.

Dissemination Area
The dissemination area is a small, relatively stable geographic unit composed of one or more blocks. It is the smallest standard geographic area for which all census data are disseminated. dissemination areas cover all the territory of Canada.

6. The block-face file was not a product in 2001 due to confidentiality rules. It was a product in 1996 but the rules have since changed. Therefore, DLI cannot have access to the block-face file.

We do not have a formal written rule about why block-face file is no longer available. The decision was made by the Disclosure Avoidance Committee at that time.

Licensing questions

Questions

1. Some researchers at Laurentian (and also Ottawa U) are involved in an NRCan grant-funded research projected about the impact of climate change in Sudbury. It seems clear to me that LU and Ottawa U researchers can participate as they are authorized users, using DLI data for academic research and publishing.

However, other groups are also participating in this project: the City of Sudbury and several consulting companies. I know that I cannot provide them with the DLI data. However, I have questions about two scenarios:

a) The non-DLI members would prefer to have Laurentian researchers do all of the research using DLI data. I see from another licensing example online that "Results of the research can be shared with the [non-DLIer], but data cannot" but I'm not sure what level of 'results' this means. Is it basically anything except the raw data, or are there more specific guidelines?

b) The non-DLI members would prefer to contribute directly to the research that involves the DLI data. I know that they will eventually need to contact the DLI directly, but I'd like to provide them with some basic information so that they can make some preliminary decisions. Does each group need to separately negotiate access to a certain dataset? This is currently a five-year project - would the cost be one-time or yearly? And in terms of cost, is it a per-survey cost, or is it based on the specific variables and geography that the researchers are interested in?

2. Western has an official program for â€Å“Visiting Graduate Students (Research Only)”
(http://www.uwo.ca/grad/documentation/visiting_research_only.pdf) under which the student pays a fee to the university, and receives research privileges here, but takes no courses at and receives no transcript from Western.

A Western graduate now studying overseas would like to use Labour Force Survey data for her thesis, but cannot afford the cost of ten years of data. She contacted Statistics Canada Advisory Services, which apparently recommended that she pursue the â€Å“visiting graduate student” route as a method of accessing data distributed through the DLI. Further, the indications from Advisory Services reported to me by the student were that this was an established procedure, and that the university largely had discretion as to whom data were provided.

What rights would the visiting graduate student have to use DLI data?

3. "Visiting scholars” and â€Å“visiting professors” go through a formal appointment process at the University before they are granted this status. Are they elgible to use DLI data?

4. I have a researcher who as one of our faculty members used DLI info. and wrote a report. She is now working with a non-profit (housing) organization and want to use the results of her DLI based report as part of a new study.

Answers and Responses

1. Answer to question 3 - This case was considered and approved. As the visiting scholar is granted the special status, he is recognised as an authorised user of DLI data.

2. Answer to question 4 - This situation is similar to one we have in our Licencing data base
http://www4.statcan.ca/english/dli/boundary/pages/displaycases.asp

under the title â€Å“An independent study that may be used as a business proposal”. In this situation the students are doing an independent study for a professor, a business proposal, which might then be used to start a Centre within the university.

In your example ” MBA students are required to complete a strategy study for a real corporation or nonprofit organization.” Since these are students at York , a DLI member, they pass that part of the eligibility requirement. Since the use is a requirement of their course work (i.e required in order to obtain a course mark) they pass this eligibility condition. And as you have pointed out "the data is not shared with the corporations/nonprofit organizations, the analysis done on this data is reported to the client in the report and presentation that they give at the end of the study.” They can not allow the corporation to access the data but they can share the results (analysis) in a report.

So in the end it looks like they do meet all of our conditions so you can allow them access to DLI data in order to complete these course requirements.

3. Answer to question 2 - Your question has been reviewed and discussed by the EAC Executive. We have reviewed the Visiting Student website at UWO to gain more insight into the program as well as obtaining additional information and considering the rights and privileges afforded students registered under this program. As you can imagine this was not an easy situation to resolve. However the final decision is that this student can be allowed to access DLI data held at UWO.

According to our understanding, students must make an official application and must meet some kind of official criteria in order to be accepted into this program. Under the Visiting Student program, registrants have the status of and are treated as UWO students. If they were to take any credit courses while â€Å“visiting”, the credits could be transferred to the university where they are pursuing a degree. As UWO students they are granted full access to UWO services including access to all commercial databases that are part of the Library. Another key factor in our deliberations is that under this program the students are in fact on campus. This is akin to a visiting professor status in a university. Previous access decisions have been in favour of access to DLI data by visiting professors.

Therefore in this situation the student meets the DLI criteria of being recognized as a registered student at a DLI institution and the use of the data is considered academic research.

Access to DLI data in this situation is APPROVED.

4. Answer to question 4 - This case was considered and approved.

We are assuming that the original research part of academic research (published in academic journal, etc.)and was made available to persons other than the researcher.

However, the researcher can not access additional DLI data to supplement the research for the non-profit organisation.

This is consistent with performing a literature review for any new research - if the information is available, you can mention it and draw from it.

Quebec Statistics Based on Provincial Electoral Districts

Question

A student is looking for socio-demographic information from Quebec by provincial electoral districts for the time period around 1998. She is looking for data related to language, ethnic origin, education and income.

Does StatCan collect any information by this geographic designation?
Is anyone else aware of a source we may use?

Answers

1. Statistics Canada does disseminate information at the Federal Electoral District level, but only through the Census. Your user has two choices - 1996 Census or 2001 Census.

2. A longshot - did 1998 Quebec provincial electoral boundaries (QPEB) coincide with federal ones, as I think they now do in Ontario? Probably too much to hope for, but worth investigating.

Do you have a GIS map of the 1998 QPEB? If you did, you could work with EA-level maps from the 1996 Census, match the demographic data onto the map, overlay the QPEB, and combine the EAs that fall within the QPEB. The problem would be dealing with the EAs that straddle QPEB boundaries.

Someone who knows a GIS would be able to describe this better, but the upshot is that you may be able to generate what the user needs from what we already have through DLI. It won̢۪t be perfect, but it may be better than nothing.

3. A link to a provincial election website that contains some great information.
http://www.electionsquebec.qc.ca/en/statistical_data.asp

Search on Statistics Canada website

Tomorrow, Statistics Canada is launching a change in the way its search engine looks for content on its website. Until now, when more than one word was entered in a query in the simple site search, the search engine looked for any of those words to satisfy the query. Beginning tomorrow, the search will by default return results for only those documents that contain all of the words in the query. This change applies only to simple search of the entire site. Advanced search options remain as before, where one may specify any words, all words, or phrase searches. Any feedback is welcome and can be addressed to infostats@statcan.ca