1. Expert Expert Group Meeting on Statistical Methodology for Delineating Cities and Rural Areas Iven M. Sikanyiti 28th-30th January 2019 United Nations: New York

2. Key concepts on Urbanization in Zambian context
Urban Place:
A locality with at least 5000 people 50% of whom are not engaged in agriculture
Such a locality should have urban attribute such as piped water, schools, hospitals, paved/tarred roads and electricity
However, centers with less than 5000 people but with urban attributes indicated above are classified as urban for the purpose of compiling urbanization data
All district and provincial administrative centers with population concentration performing services and functions are classified as urban

3. Rural Area:
These are areas that have a population less the 2,000 with households’ economic activities largely characterized by agriculture. These areas have only limited social economic facilities and are characterized by:
Low population concentration
Absence of key infrastructure such as roads, piped water, electricity etc

4. Demarcation Criteria for Urban and Rural Areas
Zambia uses a Household and Population thresholds to demarcate urban and rural Enumeration areas. The aggregation of Data for EAs gives population by rural and urban areas
Rural area Household and Population ranges from:
60 to 120 households or 300 to 600 people
Urban area Household and Population Ranges from:
150 to 200 households or 900 to 1200 people
The average household size in rural and urban areas is 5 and 6, respectively

5. Zambia’s Urban Population
As at 2010 census Zambia’s percent urban index was 39.5 percent
Large urban centres (50,000+ Population) accounted for 82.1percent of urban population while centres with population less than accounted for 17.9 percent

6. Distribution of Urban Centres by Size
Number of Centres
Population
Percent
1,000,000+ 1
1,747,152
33.8
501,360
9.7 2
653,606
12.6 6
822,744
15.9 7
502,359 13
426,090
8.2 25
362,078 9
74,310
1.4
Less than 5000 20
83,751
1.6
Total 84
5,173,450
100

7. Zambia’s Urban System

8. Degree of Urbanization Measures used in Zambia
There are two main types of indices used to measure the degree of urbanization;
the proportion or percentage of total population living in urban areas
the absolute population size of towns
Urbanization focuses on the proportion of the total population living in urban areas expressed in percentage terms (39.5% in 2010).

9. Challenges with Approach to Analyzing Urbanization
Proportion of population in urban areas does not provide detail on the geographical, social and economic conditions. It masks the different characteristics of communities within the urban centres as some localities are either low cost, medium cost or high cost
There is a proposal for the next census to calculate the degree of urbanization by;
the population size of the locality (township) and include access to portable water, sanitation, electricity, education and health facilities
2. Census data does not provide clarity as to whether the population are in the periphery of nearby villages or settlements commuting to a city on a daily/weekly basis (as in the case of Meanwood and silverest)

11. Applying the Global Degree of Urbanization to Zambian Context
The current definition of an urban area does not include density
It focuses on total urban population, main economic activity and access to services
Most high density populated areas are in actual sense unplanned squatter settlements with no access to basic services
A dense urban cluster consists of contiguous cells with a density of at least 1,500 residents per sq km and a population between 5,000 and 50,000 in the cluster. (This concept would be useful in our setting although it leaves out small urban areas with populations less than 2000)
A semi-dense urban cluster is an urban cluster located more than 2 km from a dense urban cluster or an urban centre (our locality settlements within the functional definition of the city boundary are wholly taken as part of urban population and not disticnst clusters)
Suburban cells are the remaining cells in an urban cluster, i.e. not part of a dense or semi-dense urban cluster (We currently do have townships/localities that have developed around Lusaka as a result of residential housing development but administratively such data is outside the boundary of Lusaka and its attributed to adjacent districts even when the people community to to work in the town centres daily) Case of suburbs?

12. A rural cluster consists of contiguous cells with a density of at least 300 residents per sq km and a population between 500 and 5,000 in the cluster. (We may not be able to have 300 residents per square kilometre, our rural areas are predominantly agricultural in nature covering vast kilometres but few households.)
Low density rural grid cells are cells with a density between 50 and 300 inhabitants per sq km. (This definition may not be adequate for a rural area as our lower limit for rural areas is 300 people for EA demarcation)
Very low density rural grid cells are the remaining rural grid cells, i.e. those with a density of less than 50 inhabitants per sq km (This too may not be adequate for our rural area denarcation)

13. Grid Concept and Its Use in Demarcating Enumeration Areas
With refinement in the methodology the GRID method would still be useful in the Demarcation of areas especially for Towns, Villages, Dispersed rural areas and mostly uninhabited areas.
The methodology would also help us come up with a unique way of identifying and analysing suburbs populations in a more comprehensive way
As Zambia is currently preparing for the undertaking of 2020 census we would appreciate Assistance in understanding this concept as it can help demarcation of Eas. How can we combine the GRID method with our current population thresholds to come up with acceptable analysis of urbanisation.

14. Thank You.