Smart Maritime Census

In Hong Kong, the population census covers the land population and the marine population, the latter being referred to people living on board vessels. Estimating the marine population requires enumerating the number of vessels within Hong Kong Waters.

Following the rapid development of Artificial Intelligence (AI), the Census and Statistics Department (C&SD) has been keeping abreast of technology advancement and innovation. Leveraging deep learning algorithms trained on thousands of labelled vessel images, the C&SD team has successfully developed an AI model for image analytics using aerial photos. The model can automatically detect vessels in the photos, classify and label different types of vessels according to their shapes and features, and finally calculate the number of vessels.

This model can replace the previous practice of manual identification, classification and counting of vessels, thereby saving time and resources. Moreover, the model can also reduce the error of human judgement and further improve the accuracy of statistical results. The model will be used in the 2026 Population Census to be conducted by C&SD next year to enhance the enumeration of the marine population.