Page 5 - Annuaire Statistique Québec - 1918

PREFACE

With the 1948 edition, the thirty-third puhlished by the Quebec Bureau
of Statis!ics, the graduaI modification the Statistical Year Book has undergone
during the past four years is now complete. During the period in question the
volume was revised in its entirety. Ali the statistical tables - over 550 - are
now constl'llcted according ta UnifOI'ID rules universally accepted.

Since the last of the changes judged essential have no", been effected. il.
will be possible in future ta provide more ample analyses of social, economic
and other phenomena. Already this year, we have been able ta include two
special articles that are bath timely and useful: the first, by Jean-Charles Bonen-
fant, is entitled "French Language Books and Reviews published in Canada
during the past ten years)); the second, prepared by I3ertrand-T. Denis, geologist,
treats of "Metallic :Minerals of the Province of Quebec". The mere mention
of these two titles evokes years of extraordinarily fecund intellectua! activity
and the beginning of a new Cl'a in the development of the Province's mining re-
sources.

Special care has been given ta graphical illustration. In the section devoted
ta economy, diagrams conceived in accordunce with a general plan show the
trend of various kinds of production in the Province, from 1938 ta 1947, as well
as the Province's share in the Canadian output. Ta establish the variations
from 1938 ta 1947 absolute figures were reduced ta percentages, the year 1938
being represented by 100.0, sa that the curves may all be compared ta one another.
The principal data resulting from the decennial census have also been illustrated
by means of graphs prepared accol'ding ta a previously established arder.

Strange as it may seem ta the layman, final and complete figures of a decen-
niaI census only become available five or six years after the actual census-taking.
Fol' this reason, prior ta 1948,it was impossible ta publish the principal data
relative ta the Province of Quebec as a definite and complete whole. However,
the information released during the past year and now issued in the pages of the
Year Book devoted ta the Census of the Population, Agriculture and Trade,
gives the present edition a distinctive character of its myn. In the course of
the nex!. few years there will be no further data of importance ta add ta this
section and non-essential information will be eliminated in arder ta provide
space for analyse~, special articles, etc ..