Census Analytical Report - Uganda Bureau of Statistics

Analytical ReportCHAPTER 4: AGE AND SEX COMPOSITIONAge and sex are the most basic characteristics of a population. The study of thecurrent sex and age composition of the population is useful in understanding the pasttrends of population change. Sex and age composition of a population also hassignificant implications for the reproductive potential, human resource, schoolattendance, family formation, health care, and other service delivery in general. The2002 Census collected information on sex, exact date of birth and age in completedyears of every individual enumerated.4.1 Sex CompositionThere were 95males for every100 femalesThe sex composition of the human population is one of the basic demographiccharacteristics, which is extremely vital for any meaningful analysis. It is a result ofpast trends of fertility, mortality and migration. The sex ratio defined as number ofmales per 100 females is an index for comparing the numerical balance between thepopulation of either sex in different population groups irrespective of their size,location and time reference.4.1.1 Sex Composition of the Total PopulationThe sex ratio for Uganda for the total population started by increasing from 100.2 in1948 to 101.9 in 1969 (Figure 4.1). Thereafter, there has been a consistent fall from98.2 in 1980 to the current level of 95.3 in 2002. The civil unrest in the country sincethe early 1970’s could have led to the higher male mortality and hence partly explainthe emerging findings.At the regional level, sex ratios were quite close, implying that there was no majorregional variation in the sex composition. However, the district level sex ratio in 2002varied widely from 82 percent for Kisoro to 150 percent for Kalangala (Table A1.4).33