Saudi Gazette report

JEDDAH — The Kingdom has served 95,853,017 pilgrims during the last 50 years, the General Authority for Statistic (GaStat) said on Saturday.

The number of pilgrims exceeded two million in 19 seasons, and the number of pilgrims during the past 25 years reached

(54,465,253), while the number of pilgrims during the last ten years stood at 23,796,977, according to the GaStat.

The mission of counting the number of pilgrims each year is one of the most critical tasks that GaStat has the honor of assigning to about two decades ago when it was working under the name of the Department of Statistics and Information, the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said.

The authority has been responsible for providing specific information to help the planning and development of everything related to the service of the pilgrims. This task has continued throughout these years to witness the growth of statistical methods.

The authority is required to implement three statistical projects during the Haj season (pilgrims numbers, services provided to pilgrims, and indicators of Haj management) to provide as much as information needed to support decision makers to achieve the highest degree of accuracy and comprehensiveness of data.

The Haj statistics program aims to complete all programs of plans to provide the necessary services for pilgrims, whether social, health, security, food or transportation services, using a time series for accurate data on the number of pilgrims.

Also the use of data and numbers of pilgrims by the agencies concerned with the study of facilities and necessary facilities in Makkah and the holy places, and take them into account when preparing the necessary plans for that, as well as providing the accurate data on Haj statistics for researchers, scholars, beneficiaries and those interested in this field.

GaStat will issue the final and official number of pilgrims on the evening of the 9th Dhul-Hijjah, through the Haj statistics bulletin, showing detailed results including number of residence pilgrims, number of pilgrims coming from abroad, number of pilgrims by sex, nationality, destination, and other detailed data.