KATHMANDU, Jan 3 (NNN-XINHUA) – Nepal’s urban population increased to 27.07 percent, while the rural population declined between 2011 and 2021, as people were increasingly migrating to the urban areas, according to government figures released yesterday.
As the urban population went up nearly five percent from 22.31 percent and the peri-urban population also rose from 39.19 percent to 39.75 percent during the period, the rural population decreased from 38.5 percent to 33.19 percent, according to an analysis of the 2021 census by the National Statistics Office.
“Based on the trend, the migration from rural areas to peri and urban areas provides an insight of the pressure on the urban areas to accommodate (more people) and for the rural areas to retain the population,” the office said in a press statement.
Nepal had a total population of 29.16 million under the 2021 census.
The country’s urban population should not be considered too high, but the pressure is growing for the authorities to develop more facilities in urban areas, said Yogendra Bahadur Gurung, head of the central department of population studies at the Kathmandu-based Tribhuvan University.
“It is necessary to develop urban centres in different areas of the country, to mitigate the population pressure in certain cities,” Gurung said.– NNN-XINHUA
