South Africa's population rose 19.8% to 62mln in 2022

South Africa's population grew by 19.8% or around 10 million people to 62 million in 2022 from 51.7 million in 2011, the statistics office said in a newly released census report. 

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said this was the country's first-ever digital census, compiled with data from households that were given the option of face-to-face, telephonic or online completion of the questionnaire.

It was the fourth census undertaken since the advent of democracy in 1994, he said, congratulating the enumerators for digitisation of the process to overcome restrictions to their work in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic struck.

"A census is one of the most complex exercises a nation can undertake," he said in a speech after receiving a copy of the census report. "Unless we are able to see the bigger picture, we are unable to forecast."

The census data is crucial to planning, budgeting and policy-making work of government, Ramaphosa said.

Some of the census data highlights include that the Black African population group constitutes the largest proportion of the South African population at 81.4% followed by coloureds (8.2%), white (7.3%) and Indian/Asian (2.7%). 

The results also show that 48.5% of the population is male and 51.5% is female.

Gauteng province - where the commercial capital Johannesburg and administrative capital Pretoria are located - remains the largest province in South Africa with 15.1 million people, up by 2.8 million from 2011 to 2022. 

There are about 2.4 million migrants in the country, accounting for roughly 3% of the overall population, with the majority from Zimbabwe followed by Mozambique and Lesotho.

Almost 90 percent of South Africans live in formal housing, while the percentage of households without access to piped water has more than halved to 8.7% in 2022.

Households with access to electricity increased from 58.1% in 1996 to 94.7% in 2022, according to the census.

Source: https://www.zawya.com/en/economy/africa/south-africas-population-rose-198-to-62mln-in-2022-wt7ynq54