Demographics of Ivory Coast

Population

According to the 2010 revision of the World Population Prospects the total population was 19 738 000 in 2010, compared to only 2 630 000 in 1950. The proportion of children below the age of 15 in 2010 was 40.9%, 55.3% was between 15 and 65 years of age, while 3.8% was 65 years or older .

Structure of the population (DHS 2011-2012) (Males 23 630, Females 25 193 = 48 823) :

Population Growth: 1.88% (2016 est.)

Vital statistics

Registration of vital events is in Ivory Coast not complete. The Population Departement of the United Nations prepared the following estimates.

Fertility and Births

Total Fertility Rate (TFR) (Wanted Fertility Rate) and Crude Birth Rate (CBR):

Fertility data as of 2011-2012 (DHS Program):

Ethnic groups

Ivory Coast has more than 60 ethnic groups, usually classified into five principal divisions: Akan (east and center, including Lagoon peoples of the southeast), Krou (southwest), Southern Mandé (west), Northern Mandé (northwest), Sénoufo/Lobi (north center and northeast). The Baoulés, in the Akan division, probably comprise the largest single subgroup with 15%-20% of the population. They are based in the central region around Bouaké and Yamoussoukro. The Bétés in the Krou division, the Sénoufos in the north, and the Malinkés in the northwest and the cities are the next largest groups, with 10%-15% of the national population. Most of the principal divisions have a significant presence in neighboring countries.

Of the more than 5 million non-Ivorian Africans living in Ivory Coast, one-third to one-half are from Burkina Faso; the rest are from Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Nigeria, Benin, Sénégal, Liberia, and Mauritania. The non-African expatriate community includes roughly 50,000 French (this number may be inaccurate due to the evacuation of roughly 8,000 Frenchmen in November 2004) and possibly 40,000 Lebanese. The number of elementary school-aged children attending classes increased from 22% in 1960 to 67% in 1995.

Languages

French (official), 82 indigenous languages, one that has later been extinguised, 60 of which the Dioula dialect of Bambara is the most widely spoken. Other languages include: the Gur languages, the Senufo languages, the Kru languages (including the Bété languages, Dida, Nyabwa, Wè, and Western Krahn), and the Kwa languages from which Baoulé and Anyin are notably used.

Religion

The economic development and relative prosperity of Ivory Coast fostered huge demographic shifts during the 20th century. "In 1922, an estimated 100,000 out of 1.6 million (or 6 percent) of people in Côte d'Ivoire were Muslims. By contrast, at independence (in 1960), their share of the population had increased rapidly, and Muslims were moving southward to the cocoa-producing areas and the southern cities. By 1998, [...], Muslims constituted a majority in the north of the country, and approximately 38.6 percent of the total population. This was a significantly larger population than the next largest religious group, Christians, who constituted approximately 29.1 percent of the total." In earlier decades, this shift was mainly due to large-scale immigration from neighboring countries of the interior, that has been going on since colonial times and continued to be promoted during the Houphouet-Boigny era. Since the 1990s, the widening fertility gap between different religious groups has continued to tilt the demographic balance in favor of Muslims although immigration has become less important.

Ivorian diaspora

The table below shows the number of people born in Ivory Coast who have migrated to OECD countries only (the table only includes communities consisting of at least 1,000 members).

CIA World Factbook demographic statistics

The following demographic statistics are from the CIA World Factbook, unless otherwise indicated.

Population

21,058,798 (2010 est.)Note: estimates for this country explicitly take into account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS; this can result in lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality and death rates, lower population and growth rates, and changes in the distribution of population by age and sex than would otherwise be expected (July 2010 est.)

Major infectious diseases

Note: highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza has been identified in this country; it poses a negligible risk with extremely rare cases possible among US citizens who have close contact with birds (2009)

Nationality

Noun and adjective: Ivorian (Ivoirian)

Literacy

Here literacy is defined as the ratio of people over age 15 who can read and write.