Ghana's population hits 27.9 million

Ghana’s mid-year population is now estimated at 27.9 million, up from the 24 million recorded in the 2012 National Population and Housing Census, Chief Statistician at the Statistical Service, David Y. Kombat has disclosed.

He stated that the Statistical Service was worried that some people in high public offices continue to quote the 2010 population figures, which could mislead people into formulating policies based on old figures.

Mr. Kombat, who is also the Director of Communications and Dissemination, said the projected annual growth rate of the country’s population was 2.5 percent, which put the population at 27.9 million from the last census, adding that people should consult the service for update of the population figures.

He stressed the need for accuracy in the use of population figures to be able to formulate and implement policies based on credible data, adding “We should always update our figures, they will make people plan based on wrong data.”

He said the service had trained some District Planning Officers on the Information Management System software which would enable them to generate demographic data for planning purposes.

“We expect these planning officers to generate current data on the population so that we do not use the 2012 figures for planning when we have grown by five years,” Mr. Kombat said.

The Chief Statistician expressed concern about the frequent changes of planning officers to other areas to do activities in different fields saying that it undermines the use of their expertise and skills in development planning.

Mr. Kombat was also concerned about the fact that some of those officers were being poached by other institutions by offering them better conditions of service and lamented the loss of core skills at the decentralized governance level.

Touching on other things, the Chief Statistician said the service was in the process of undertaking the second phase of the Integrated Business Establishment Survey (IBES) to generate more data on industrial establishment in the country, adding that the first phase survey conducted in 2014, was being analyzed.

Mr. Kombat said very little data on non-industrial establishment had been collected in the country, explaining that the results of the first phase was expected to provide information on the structure and performance of the various sectors.

That, he said, would assist in the formulation of policies to accelerate economic growth, and also generate more awareness in the nature of productive activities in the micro, small and medium enterprises to serve as basis for provision of assistance to those enterprises which had a great potential for generating employment.