KATHMANDU, Jan 27: The female population is seen further increasing in this national census as compared to the previous census. The Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), a body under the National Planning Commission, released the preliminary results of the National Population Census 2021 on Wednesday.
As per the preliminary results of the National Population Census-2021, the total population of the country is 29 million 192 thousand 480 and of this number 14 million 901 thousand 169 (51.04%) are women and 14 million 291 thousand 311 (48.96%) are men. The National Population Census held in 2011 counted the total population of Nepal at 26 million 494 thousand 504 and of this male population constituted 48.5 % and the female population 51.5%.
The preliminary results of the 2021 population census show that the gender ratio (the number of males per 100 females) is 95.91. The gender ratio as per the 2011 Census was 94.16. The total population as counted in the latest census is more by 2 million 697 thousand 976 compared to the total population as per the 2011 census.
This shows that Nepal's population has increased by 10.18% in 10 years. The average annual population growth rate in the last decade is 0.93% and it was 1.35% in the previous census.
The first phase field work of the 2021 Census was carried out from September 15 to October 4 and the second phase field work was done from November 11 to 17, 2021. One thousand eight hundred and seventy one employees were mobilized for managerial work of the National Population Census 2021 at the province and district level while around 8,500 supervisors and 39 thousand enumerators were engaged in the field work. The forms (house and household listing form, main questionnaire and community questionnaire) filled with the conclusion of the two-phase field work were collected at the CBS and the data processing was begun.
Number of family increases
As per the preliminary results, the number of families normally residing in Nepal is 6 million 761 thousand 59 and they are found living in a total 5 million 643 thousand 945 houses. According to this, 12 families on an average are found living in 10 houses. The number of families at present has increased by about 24.57% compared to a decade back. A total of 1 million 333 thousand 757 families have been added during this period.
The family size is 4.32 persons per family. The family size as per the 2011 Census was 4.88 persons per family. There are roughly 4.25 persons per family in the urban area while 4.55 persons per family in the rural areas. The family size ten years back was 4.32 persons per family in urban areas and 5.02 persons per family in the rural areas.
Geographical region-wise, the family size is 4.27 persons per family in the mountainous region, 3.95 persons per family in the hilly region and 4.65 persons per family in the Terai region. On a province-wise basis, the average number of family members is the lowest in Gandaki province (3.36 persons per family) and the highest in Madhes province (5.66 persons per family). This was 4.16 and 5.80 persons per family respectively as per the 2011 Census. District-wise, Dolakha district has the lowest size family (3.41 persons) and Rautahat has the largest size family of 5.92 persons.
Government unveils result of National Census 2021
Population increases in Terai
According to the geographical region, the distribution of total population of the portion of the Terai region has increased in 2021 as compared to 2011. As per the 2011 Census 50.27% of the total population was in Tarai and this has increased to 53.66% in 2021. The mountainous region had a 6.73% component of the total population in 2011 and it has decreased to 6.09% in 2021. Similarly, the hilly region had 43.01% component of the total population in 2011 and it has decreased to 40.25% in 2021.
The gender ratio has decreased by 1 percentage point in the Tarai while it has increased by 3 percentage points in the mountainous and 4 percentage points in the hilly region in a period of ten years. It was 94, 91 and 97 in the Mountainous, Hilly and Tarai region respectively in the 2011 Census and stands at 97, 95 and 96 in the Mountainous, Hilly and Terai regions respectively in 2021.
Looking at the annual population growth rate, it is negative (- 0.02%) in the Mountainous region, positive by miniscule (0.29%) in the Hilly region and highly positive (1.56%) in the Terai region as compared to the rest of the geographical regions.
Province-wise population change and growth rate
Considering province-wise population distribution, Madhes province has the highest population (6 million 126 thousand 288) and Karnali province has the lowest population (1 million 694 thousand 889), which is 20.99% and 5.81% respectively of the total population.
The gender-wise analysis shows that Madhes province has the largest gender ratio at 101 while Sudurpaschim province has the lowest gender ratio at 90.
The annual population growth rate is highest in Lumbini province and the lowest in Gandaki province. Lumbini province has 1.25% per annum population growth rate while it is 0.30% per annum in Gandaki province. The Madhes province has the second highest population growth rate. Its population growth rate is 1.20% per annum. The rest of the provinces have less than 1.0% population growth rate.
Kathmandu has the highest and Manang the least number of population
Among the 77 districts across the country, Kathmandu has the highest population at 2,017,532 while Manang has the least at 5,645. Morang has the second highest population while Rupandehi third highest, Jhapa fourth and Sunsari fifth.
Mustang comes second in terms of least population while Dolpa, Rasuwa and Humla come thereafter.
In terms of gender ratio, Manang has 130, the highest, while Pyuthan has 82, the lowest. A total of 32 districts from hill and mountain regions have a negative/declining rate of population.
As compared to the previous census in 2011, Bhaktapur has the highest population growth rate at 3.32 percent while Ramechhap has the most declining rate of population at -1.65 percent. Among the mountainous districts, Mugu has the highest population growth rate at 1.80 percent.
Considering Metropolis, Sub-Metropolis and Municipality as urban places and rural municipality as the rural area, 66.08 percent of the total population live in urban areas.
In the previous census in 2011, there were 58 municipalities and 17.07 percent of the population dwelt in urban areas while the remaining 82.93 percent lived in rural areas.
According to the preliminary results of the National Census 2021, among the metropolis and municipalities, Kathmandu, Pokhara, Bharatpur, Lalitpur and Birgunj had the highest population while Thuli Bheri, Tripurasundari, Madi, Laliguras and Jiri municipality had the least population respectively.
Kathmandu Metropolitan City recorded 865,906 population while Thulibheri recorded the least population at 10,187. There are a total of 14 municipalities having below 20,000 population while 39 municipalities had over 100,000 population.
Among the rural municipalities, Baijanath rural municipality in Banke district reported the highest population at 70,315 while Narpabhumi rural municipality in Manang reported the least at 442. A total of 46 rural municipalities had below 10,000 population while those rural municipalities having over 50,000 population are 15.
When it comes to density, population density in Nepal remains at 198 per square kilometer which was 180 per square kilometer in 2011. Geographically, Terai region has the highest density at 461 against 392 per square kilometer in 2011 while mountainous region has the same 34 per square kilometer in both 2011 and 2021.
District-wise, Kathmandu district has the highest population density at 5,108 per square kilometer while Manang has the lowest density at 3 per square kilometer. Bhaktapur, Lalitpur, Dhanusha and Mahottari are the second, third, fourth and fifth densest districts respectively after Kathmandu.
Similarly, the preliminary result of the census of 2021 puts the number of Nepalis abroad at 2,169,478. Among them 1,762,315 (81.28 percent) were male and the remaining were female. These numbers of people were absent during the census recording and were said to be abroad.
In the 2011 census, the number of people staying abroad stood at 1,921,494 among them 1684029 (86.62 percent) were male and remaining were female. The exodus of females abroad has increased during the past decade and has increased by 71.09 percent.
