Hand-delivery of Census forms to households around the Far North has started following a delay related to Cyclone Gabrielle.

Since Census Day on March 7, when the forms were supposed to have been completed, the Northern Advocate has fielded calls from concerned Far North residents who hadn’t received census packs and didn’t know when, or if, they would be delivered.

While the census can be completed online, a 12-character access code printed on the census pack is required to do so.

The affected area is the top half of the Far North, from Kāeo and North Hokianga up to Cape Reinga.

On Monday, however, collectors started a door-to-door delivery campaign that will target every household in the top of the Far North and take two to three weeks to complete.

Collectors would then return in a few weeks’ time to pick up the completed forms.

Rāniera Kaio, spokesman for the iwi-led census in the Far North, said Stats NZ had been asked for an extension to the census due to the after-effects of Cyclone Gabrielle.

He was grateful Stats NZ had agreed to the request but it had unfortunately not been well communicated to the public.

A similar extension had been granted in Tairāwhiti, where the cyclone’s effects had been much worse.

Local iwi believed the weeks immediately after the cyclone, when many people were still without power and “not in the right headspace”, was not a suitable time for the census.

• Chris Knox: Completing the Census is more important than voting
• Census 2023 questions and answers: Everything you need to know
• 2023 census first to collect gender and sexual identity data

This year’s census was iwi-led in the top of the Far North because of the area’s low response rate in the 2018 census.

That meant a different approach was needed with collectors hand-delivering census packs and taking time to answer any questions.

“It will be a more personal approach to communicate the importance of completing the census. It won’t be just, ‘knock, knock, here’s your form, see you in a couple of weeks’. We do regret the extension wasn’t communicated very well but rest assured, everyone in the Far North will be counted. There will still be time to receive and complete the form,” he said.

A series of events would also be organised around the Far North, starting in Kāeo this Saturday, to encourage people to take part.

Staff would be available at the “assisted collection events” to answer questions and help fill in the forms.

Kaio said census statistics were needed to provide a complete picture of the needs in the Far North, and helped government agencies decide where health services, schools, kura kaupapa, early childhood centres and kohanga reo were required.

While Kāeo-based Te Rūnanga o Whaingaroa had the contract for the iwi-led census, it was being run with a collective of Far North iwi to ensure local collectors were used in each area.

“It won’t be a case of Hone from Kāeo collecting in Te Hapua, it’ll be Tipene from Te Hapua collecting in Te Hapua,” he said.