Census data is released
Campaign News | Tuesday, 15 November 2005
Cuba is pictured in detail
Cubans now number more than 11 million.
Population grew by 1,454,138 inhabitants between the 1981 and 2002 Censuses
Men: 50.03%; women: 49.7%
Those 60 or over make up 14.7% ? 75.9% reside in urban areas
The provinces of City of Havana, Holguín and Santiago de Cuba each have more than 1 million inhabitants
Secondary and higher education graduates number almost 6.5 million, of whom almost 1 million are professionals
95.5% of homes have electricity (99.6% in urban areas)
BY IRAIDA CALZADILLA RODRÍGUEZ-Granma daily staff writer-
THE National Office of Statistics (ONE) has just displayed the fruits of a complex labor during which more than 95,000 people, including students, professors, workers and leaders of almost every state agency, along with the cooperation of many of us who reside here, were involved in the various and diverse tasks of an extremely important investigation, described as the most complete of its type undertaken before or after the Revolution: the National Report on the most recent Population and Housing Census of 2002.
This is the third post-1959 census and the eighteenth in Cuban history (the last one was in 1981). According to José Luis Rodríguez, minister of economy and planning, it reflects a very important stage, because it takes in a decade of growth and development of the national economy, as well as 10 years of the Special Period and recovery.
The minister referred to several peculiarities: it is the census of a country that is developed through its soundness and characteristics, undertaken by a country that does not have the resources of a developed country, but that optimized those that it does have; the work was effected very diligently and in an organized manner, and the human factor was decisive in mobilizations, above all, at the peak point; it is the first done on the island by decentralizing and digitalizing information, which required higher quality control.
Rodríguez affirmed it: there is no census in the world that is as trustworthy as this one; the quality of the work was achieved thanks to the Revolution, and resources were used as efficiently as they were because of our social system. He adds that this is part of a process of improving Cuban statistics, which must be able to reflect our changes and lay the foundations for everything that we set out to do in the future. They must reflect everything having to do with the Revolution, demonstrate its reality.
THE ISLAND IN PERCENTAGES
The 2002 Census covered 99.83% of homes and 99.77% of individuals, which demonstrates the consistency and sustainability of its results for use in diverse areas of decision making.
According to Juan Carlos Alfonso Fraga, general director of the Census and the ONE Center for Population and Development Studies, the document shows that at the time of the census the island’s permanent residents numbered 11,177,743 in 3,534,327 units of accommodation, for an average of 3.16 people per unit. Of these, 99.8% were units of private housing built specifically for that purpose.
In total, since the previous census, the population grew by 1,454,138 inhabitants and units of accommodation grew by 1,165,854; this demonstrates a relationship of 1.25 inhabitants per unit of accommodation.
Other interesting facts: 95.5% of homes have electricity (in urban areas, it is as high as 99.6%); 96.4% have kitchen areas; 91.3% of units and 92.6% of the population, have sanitary services inside or outside of the accommodation. The average number of people per total rooms in each home is 0.8 and per bedroom 1.3, which reveals that there is no overcrowding on a national level.
MORE WOMEN, MORE ELDERLY AND MORE MIXING
The Census notes an equilibrium of genders, given that 50.03% of permanent residents are male and 49.97% are female. The country is showing a process of aging, with 14.7% of its inhabitants aged 60 or over, while the average age of the population is 35.1. There is also a tendency to more mixing between different ethnic groups, with more people classified by skin color as mixed-race: up to 24.9%, higher than in the 1981 Census, and likewise there were more unmarried couples living together, divorcees and widows, and a decrease in the number of single women.
Of the total population, 75.9% lives in urban areas; 54.5% in cities (human settlements of more 20,000 or more), and 39.4% in cities of 100,000 or more. The provinces with at least one million inhabitants included City of Havana, Holguín and Santiago de Cuba.
The country’s population density in 2002 was 101.7 inhabitants per square kilometer. Thu, 92.5% of the population resided in the 7,075 settlements in Cuban territory, and only 835,297 individuals live in so-called dispersed settlements; 6.2% in the mountains and just 0.01% in the cays.
A LITTLE BIT OF EVERYTHING
Cuba’s population today is showing an impressive increase in educational levels, with nearly 6.5 million people having graduated from secondary or higher schools; the average grade level for individuals ages 15 and over is 9.5.
Almost 50% of those who are 15 or over are economically active and 97% were employed (currently, they are now more than 98%). Of that workforce, 22.9% are professionals and technicians (almost one million), and 61.3% of them are women. The average age in that layer of the population is 40, and the average educational level is almost 11th grade (10.9). Of those currently working, 85.42% have completed high school.
And for those concerned that the capital is full to capacity: 32% of its inhabitants - 700,242 people - were not born there. Other data indicates that approximately 30% of the Cuban population, some 3.4 million inhabitants, reside somewhere else than their birthplace; 0.14% were born in other countries; and 40.7% of our people were born in eastern provinces, while 916,241 have migrated to other provinces and 327,818 to Havana.
These facts and many others are reported by the 2002 Census, a compendium that takes in human settlements in Cuba, their number, size, homes, accommodation units, and housing development, as well as specificities related to the population: their residential areas, skin color, marital status, families, ages and migrations, among other details necessary to taken into account when making decisions.
One example of that is that subsequent to the Census, it has been used in a permanent and continuous manner, with the submission of some 80 informative reports for knowledge and decision-making in important aspects related to the country’s social policies; for increasing quality of life conditions for the population; for defense; the housing program; and social, economic and demographic studies and research on national and regional levels, as Juan Carlos Alfonso Fraga explained.
A TASK OF INTEGRATION
Officially presenting the report, Oscar Mederos, head of the National Office of Statistics emphasized the importance of this work for the country, given that few nations can demonstrate such an effective utilization and rapid introduction of the census results into economic and social life, beyond what they signify for statistics, researchers and the population itself.
Internationally, he said, this census is considered to be the most important statistical information that the nation has undertaken. In our case, it has the official sponsorship of the government; all permanent residents and their housing were included, and it was all done at the same time, over 10 days. The compendium of information is divided into 13 chapters and 61 charts that explain general, population, educational, economic and housing characteristics.
He also demonstrated the homepage of the Official Site of the Government of the Republic of Cuba, which is administered by the ONE. He added that as of October 30, during this year 3,560,226 pages had been visited by 16,321,569 Internet users from more than 120 nations, without counting Cuba, and 1,759 requests for information have arrived from every continent. The National Report on the Population and Housing Census has already been posted on the site.
He also announced that the National Report is to be followed by other studies and analyses on different issues researched during the Census, which will be carried out jointly with government agencies and research and academic centers.
The presentation was attended by Juan Carlos Robinson, member of the Political Bureau of the Party; Ernesto Suárez, secretary of the National Assembly of People’s Power; and Roberto Verrier, president of the Association of Cuban Economists, among other leaders. The digital version of the report was symbolically presented to the Ministries of Education; Culture; and Science, Technology and the Environment, as well as to the Union of Young Communists, so that it can be extended to all of their information networks.
http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2005/noviembre/lun14/curso.html
