A growing number of people are leaving cities for rural and suburban areas, a trend known as counter-urbanisation. While the environmental impacts of urban growth are well understood, an international team of researchers led by WorldPop postgraduate researcher Qianwen Duan say much less is known about what happens when people move in the opposite direction. […]
Moving to the countryside: what does it mean for nature? Read More »
How can we move beyond national population projections to understand how populations may change in individual regions, cities and communities? That question was at the heart of a recent visit to WorldPop by Samir KC, one of the world’s leading demographers, professor at the Asian Demographic Research Institute (ADRI), Shanghai University, and a Senior Research
Building the next generation of population futures: Samir KC visits WorldPop Read More »
As climate change, urban growth and human movement reshape the world around us, the diseases carried by mosquitoes are changing too. Malaria, dengue and other mosquito-borne illnesses are appearing in new places, putting more communities at risk than ever before. A new Perspective paper in Environmental Change and Disease Dynamics and co-authored by WorldPop visitor
How human expertise and AI can support vector-borne disease control Read More »
Creating accurate population maps often starts with a challenge: population data are typically reported for administrative areas, but decisions need to be made at a much finer scale. To help bridge that gap, we have released pyDasymetric, a free, open-source Python package that makes it easier to redistribute population counts into high-resolution gridded population datasets
Turning Population Counts into High-Resolution Maps with pyDasymetric Read More »
More than 420 people from around the world have helped shape the future of WorldPop. Researchers, government analysts, public health specialists, humanitarian practitioners and technical experts responded to our recent user requirements survey, sharing how they use WorldPop data, what works well and where they see opportunities for improvement. What they told us was both
You told us what you need. We’re acting on it. Read More »
How do we make sure data reflects the people and places it is meant to represent? And how can cities make better decisions in an increasingly complex world? These were some of the questions explored by Dr Jessica Espey, Deputy Director (Research) at WorldPop, during recent engagements at the Royal Geographical Society Annual Conference in
From local knowledge to global decisions: advancing inclusive data science Read More »
Reliable population data is one of the foundations of effective decision-making. Governments use it to plan schools, hospitals and infrastructure. Humanitarian agencies rely on it to deliver aid. Health organisations need it to estimate how many vaccines, medicines and health workers are required in different communities. Yet for many countries, obtaining accurate and up-to-date population
New Ways to Count Populations When the Census Falls Short Read More »
A global team, including WorldPop researchers Dr Eimear Cleary and Dr Shengjie Lai, has found that staying away from sick areas can make outbreaks worse. This happens if local case reports are not accurate. The study shows how travel habits can distort health data. It can mislead the public in a big way. When a
Why staying away from infection hotspots can backfire Read More »
Following recent devastating mudflows in Nepal’s Rasuwa District, WorldPop’s open spatial demographic data has been critical in rapidly assessing the human impact of the disaster. By combining satellite imagery of the 20 km² affected area with WorldPop’s open demographic datasets, the preliminary analysis published by UNOSAT on ReliefWeb estimated that approximately 2,000 people were exposed
Open Data Aiding Relief Efforts in Nepal and Tibet Read More »
Syria now has its first nationally approved digital system for selecting households for surveys. Developed with WorldPop’s support, it will help produce more reliable population data for public services, recovery and future censuses. Years of conflict and limited international engagement have made nationwide surveys difficult. This has left government, UN agencies and development partners without
Syria gains its first national digital sampling frame to strengthen official statistics Read More »
The WorldPop research programme, based in the School of Geography and Environmental Sciences at the University of Southampton, is a multi-sectoral team of researchers, technicians and project specialists that produces data on population distributions and characteristics at high spatial resolution.
Initiated in October 2013 to combine The AfriPop Project, AsiaPop and AmeriPop projects, we have a diverse portfolio of projects, including large multi-million-pound collaborative projects with partner organisations, commercial data providers and international development organisations.
WorldPop develops and publishes open, high-resolution population datasets to support social, economic, and environmental development, humanitarian response, and the Sustainable Development Goals. This data is not intended, and should not be used, for purposes that discriminate against, exploit, surveil, or otherwise harm individuals or vulnerable populations; users are expected to apply it responsibly, assess the risks of their own analyses (particularly when combining it with other datasets) and are solely responsible for how they use it.
