Problems of Census in West Africa:

(i). High Cost of Census: Censuses are supposed to be conducted at a 10 year interval. The high cost of conducting census has made it impossible for West African countries to conduct censuses at regular intervals.

(ii). Bad town planning and inaccessibility of some areas: In many developing countries street and houses are not properly numbered. This makes it difficult for census officials to locate people for enumeration.

(iii). Shortage of census officers: In many developing countries there are very few qualified census officers. During census all kinds of people are used without any proper training. This makes census figures inaccurate.

(iv). Customary beliefs: Certain beliefs in West Africa work against census. In certain cultures people can not be counted.

(v) Suspicion of use of census data. There can be deliberate falsehood on number of people declared in order to get more resources.