Bulawayo’s population remained almost stagnant for the past 10 years registering a marginal growth of just 2 percent between 2012 and 2022, the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZIMSTAT) Census 2022 preliminary report released Tuesday has shown.
According to the report, Zimbabwe’s population grew by 16.2 percent from 13,061,239 in 2012 to 15,178,979 in 2022 with an annual growth rate of 1.5 percent.
Recording the lowest annual growth rate (0.2 percent), Bulawayo Metropolitan Province’s population which stood at 653,337 in 2012 now stands at 665,940.
Matabeleland South Population figures slightly went up from 683,893 to 760,345 during the period under review while Matabeleland North now has a population of 827,626 up from 749,017 in 2012.
Harare Metropolitan, which remains the country’s most populous province now has a population of 2,427,209 up from 2,123,132 after registering an annual growth of 1.3 over the past 10 years.
Population figures for the three Matabeleland provinces especially Bulawayo are likely to rile stakeholders who had estimated the city’s population at 1 million in 2012 dismissing ZIMSTAT figures as cooked.
“The population of Zimbabwe as at 20th April 2022 was 15,178,979, of which 7,289,558 (48%) were male and 7,889,421 (52%) were female, giving a sex ratio of 92 males for every 100 females. Given the 2012 population size of 13,061,329, this gives an annual population growth rate of 1.5 percent,” read the report in part.
“The population constituted 3,818,992 households, giving an average of 4 persons per household. Given a land area of 390,757 square kilometres, the resultant population density stood at 39 persons per square kilometre.”
The distribution of the population by province for the year 2022 indicates that Harare Province constituted 16 percent of the total population, followed by Manicaland and Mashonaland West Provinces with 13.4 and 12.5 percent respectively.
“The distribution of the population by province for year 2022 indicates that Harare Province had 2,427,209 persons,” says the report.
“Manicaland and Mashonaland West Provinces had 2,037,762 and 1,893,578 persons respectively. In all provinces, the female population was higher than the male population.”
Population Distribution by Province and Sex shows the ratios ranged from 86 males per 100 females in Bulawayo Province to 98 males per 100 females in Mashonaland West Province.
“The distribution of households shows that Harare Province had 653,562 households followed by Manicaland and Mashonaland West Provinces with 502,945 and 466,843 respectively,” reads the report.
“Masvingo Province had the highest average household size of 4.17 followed by Matabeleland North Province with 4.15.
