“Regarding the rate of population growth at the district levels, seven of the 14 districts grew at higher than 3.0 per cent per annum in the 2004-2015 intercensal period. These included the Western Rural Area (8.5 per cent), Koinadugu (3.9 per cent), Tonkolili (3.9 per cent), Pujehun (3.8 per cent) and Kono (3.7 per cent).”
The above is from a Statistics Sierra Leone and UNFPA report on the 2015 census published in 2017.
(Title: Sierra Leone 2015 Population and Housing Census. Thematic Report on
POPULATION STRUCTURE AND POPULATION DISTRIBUTION)
That 2017 report highlighted the seven fastest growing districts in Sierra Leone. The fastest growing district between 2004-2015 was the Western Area Rural District, followed by Koinadugu, Tonkolili, Pujehun, and Kono.
Kenema District was not among the seven fast growing districts. I was therefore surprised to see that five years later Kenema has more inhabitants than any other District.
2015 Kenema Population = 609,891
2021 Kenema Population = 772,472
According to the 2021 midterm census report there are 162,581 more people in Kenema today than in 2015. It has more people than Freetown Urban and Rural.
I’ve been to Kenema and it is one of my favorite places. Could someone who is a statistician please explain how the district was able to grow so fast in just five years? Has there been a lot of migrant into Kenema because of an economic boom? Are people having more babies?
If you could help me make sense of this I would appreciate it. Also, after explaining that if you could also touch on Bo on the same issue because I’m curious how there are more people in Bo than in Freetown Urban and Rural.
(Source of Data for 2015 from StatSL as seen on Page 7 of this 2017 UNFPA report here – https://sierraleone.unfpa.org/sites/default/files/pub-pdf/Population%20structure%20Report_1.pdf)