A new study by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) is showing how smart use of population data can save lives in the face of natural disasters, with WorldPop’s co-produced data at its core.
In partnership with national governments and the UNFPA team behind the study, WorldPop developed high-resolution, gridded population estimates for Latin America and the Caribbean. These datasets were built using official national figures and refined through collaboration with UNFPA’s Latin America and Caribbean Regional Office to ensure accuracy and local relevance.
The population estimates, disaggregated by age and sex and mapped at 1×1 km grid cells, allowed researchers to assess how different groups, including youth, women of reproductive age, and older adults, are exposed to hazards like floods, earthquakes, and cyclones.
By overlaying these demographic data with hazard zones from UNDRR’s Global Risk Model, the study maps how exposure varies subnationally across the Latin America and Caribbean region.
This collaboration shows how demographic intelligence, like that produced by WorldPop, can drive smarter, more inclusive disaster planning – helping protect the most vulnerable from growing climate risks.
Learn more
- Read the full UNFPA/UNDRR study
- Read about how the population estimates were constructed (Nature – Scientific Data)
