INEGI – Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografía / National Institute of Statistics and Geography

INEGI is the Mexican government office in charge of statistics concerning populations, census, agriculture, manufacturing and many other industries. INEGI is also the place for people to look and or purchase topographic maps, as well as those maps showing populations, agriculture, water basins, geographic features, minerals and many others. INEGI also has aerial photos of just about anywhere in Mexico to look at or to purchase that in many case can be more up to date than services like Google Earth offers.

There are many other services that INEGI offers, the only problem is that not all offices have someone that may speak English. So if your Spanish is not that good you may need some assistance but the people I personally have worked with in La Paz are very helpful, patience and speak some English. Here we have included some information from their site as well as their Baja California locations. Two of which are in Baja (Norte) in Tijuana and the other in Mexicali and the one in Baja Sur is located in the capital city of La Paz.

1. - What is the INEGI? The National Institute of Statistics and Geography INEGI is a public agency with technical and management autonomy, it has is own legal entity, which is responsible to govern and coordinate the National Statistical and Geographic Information System, as well as realize the national census, integrate the national accounts system and realize the national summary of Industrial and Consumer Prices. INEGI is where you may purchase topographic maps and aerial photos as well.

2. – What is the Mission of INEGI? The Mission of the INEGI is to generate, integrate and provide statistical and geographic information of national interest, as well as to govern, coordinate and promote the development of National Statistical and Geographic System Information, in order to satisfy the information needs of the diverse society organizations.

3. - Who controls it? The institute is integrated by a Governing Council (controlled by the director and three representatives of the Secretary of Tax and Public Credit    (Hacienda, which is the IRS equivalent in Mexico), a commissioner of the Secretary of Economy, the President of the INEGI and three assistants.

To reach their objectives in the country, the INEGI has ten regional offices and 34 state coordination departments. In Baja California Sur the institute has a State Coordination department in the city of La Paz in Altamirano Street 2790 / Navarro, Plaza  Cuatro Molinos; (4 Windmills) Col. Centro.

4. – What is the function of the State Office? The state level office exists to collect statistical information (by the execution of censuses of population and home investigation, as well as  economic and farming statistics; to collect information via  surveys at homes and establishments, as well as the reception of administrative registries, that feed and update the economic and demographic data of the state); geographical information (generation and update of basic cartography and subject matter, special geographic studies, attention to the National Geodesic Network station, as well as the update of the urban cartography), the State Coordination office has an Information center to help the people interested in knowing about the territory, the population and the economy of our country, its states and their municipalities, with a space to study the publications, maps and letters, or for those who want to obtain them; as well as the site of the Institute on the Internet. www.inegi.gob.mx     

 
What is the difference between Population Census and a Population Count?
The population census contains much more information; for example, the marital status, the economic activity, housing conditions, the kinship relation from the members of the home, etc. The questionnaire that is used has more than 40 questions and the time to collect the information is over 20 and 25 minutes in average.

a) On the other side the Population Count is smaller in content, and by the same, it captures less information. The questionnaire is little and the time to answer it is among 10 and 15 minutes of average.

b) Both are realized every 10 years, the Population census in the years finished in zero and Population Count to the ones finished in five, in order to compare numbers with international scale.

c) Although in both the information comes from the same inhabitants the results obtained differ to eachother as its content.

d) Both censuses, made through direct interviews, have as an objective to obtain a total cover of the population to identify and count each one of the homes and resident people in the national territory.

Tijuana INEGI office location:

Mexicali INEGI office location:

La Paz INEGI office location: