South Africa’s population has grown to more than 62 million people since the 2011 census. The population of the country grew by 19.8 percentage points between 2011 and 2022, the largest percentage change in population size since 1996.
Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) released the 2022 census data on Tuesday. Concerns have been raised that population growth is outpacing economic growth (approximately 15% since 2011.
Kevin Lings, chief economist at Stanlib Asset Management is a major problem when the population growth is higher than the economic growth. They add that South Africa’s population growth is also high on a global standard.
They explain that the census data indicates that the country’s population is growing by 1.6% annually while the Global average is around 1%. The economic growth in the last 10 years stood at about 0.8%.
That difference may not sound like a lot but over time it amounts up enormously
Lings that while some people could benefit, this bulk of the population would feel as if their living conditions are in decline.
The problem in South Africa is that you are in an environment already with exacerbated income inequality and extreme unemployment.
Lings believes that the government must prioritise addressing challenges like the electricity crisis and other infrastructure challenges as without them it will be difficult to achieve higher economic growth rates.
Living Conditions In South Africa
The 2022 census data provides insights into living conditions in South Africa. The majority of the population, 88.5%, live in formal dwellings, with 8.1% in informal dwellings and 3.1% in traditional dwellings.
A small fraction of the population, 0.3%, reported living in other types of dwellings.
Regarding access to piped water, 59.7% of households have piped (tap) water inside their dwellings, while 22.7% have access to piped water within their yards. A lesser portion, 8.9%, relies on piped water from a community stand, while 8.7% reported having no access to piped water.
In terms of main toilet facilities, 70.8% of people have flush toilets. A smaller percentage of households use pit toilets (21.9%), chemical toilets (2.6%), or bucket toilets (2.1%), while 1.6% reported having no toilet facilities at all.
The data on refuse disposal reveals that 66.3% have their refuse removed by the local authority at least once a week, while a few have it removed less often (1.3%). Some rely on communal refuse dumps (1.6%) or communal container/central collection points (3.3%), but a significant portion, 22.3%, use refuse dumps, and 4.5% have no rubbish disposal.
For energy sources, 64.9% use electricity from mains for cooking, 25.7% use gas, and 2.7% use paraffin. When it comes to energy for lighting, the majority, 94.7%, use electricity from mains, while a small fraction uses candles (3.2%), paraffin (0.9%), solar (0.7%), gas (0.3%), and other sources (0.1%). A minority of 0.2% reported having no lighting source.
