Keta District (Volta Region, Ghana) Population

Here it is, the first ever interactive map for the Keta District using Tableau Software (and a mapping tip from Cleary and Simply).  In case you’re not familiar with Lumana, our microfinance operation is based in Atorkor and has officially expanded to the nearby villages of Dzita and Dzita Agbledomi, but also includes clients from Srogboe and Anloga. 

On the left is a map of the district with the size of the circle representing the size of the population.  On the right is a graph depicting population over the last 40 years of the 20th century.  Notice that the village of Keta used to have the highest population in the 60’s but has now fallen severely.  This is mostly due to land loss from erosion.  During my stay in Ghana, I observed that many of the villagers were full of children and grandparents.  What the growth rate doesn’t reveal is how many young adults are leaving rural areas for opportunities in the cities, and sending children to live with the grandparents back in the village.  For that we would need to look at age composition over time, but unfortunately I only have data for the year 2000 as you can see in my last post. 
* Click on any city name to highlight it on the map.  Hover over any data point to see the numbers. 
* Select the “arrow” graphic at the bottom to zoom in on the map and pan around.  

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Keta District (Volta Region, Ghana) Demographic Info

As part of our microfinance project in Ghana (Lumana), I’ve been looking into a report published by the Keta District Assembly on the progress of their Development Plan in 2000.  Ghana is pretty tribal, so it’s expected that over 91% of the population in our area is Ewe (eh-way).  Also typical throughout Africa is a young population, for our district over 81% of the population is under age 30 and 40% is under age 14.  What is also interesting is that over 80% of the population is self employed without an employee.  This closely matches my observations on the ground and actually results in oversaturation of the market and depresses prices below profitable levels (the point of a business in rural Ghana is not always for profit, but to maintain cash flow, so non-profitable ones don’t close down). 

Part of what Lumana hopes to achieve this summer through our Open Data Kit project is to update and build on this information.  We intend to leverage this demographic data in order to facilitate new international social business ventures, as well as invest in local “shovel ready” businesses so that industries can undergo some consolidation, processes can be improved, and economies of scale can be achieved. 

Later, I’ll publish info on transportation, agriculture, schools, market revenue streams, etc. 

*Click on any data point on a graph to see the numbers. 

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