The Population of China

In a few weeks I will be travelling to China for a conference, where I'm co-presenting a paper on regional inequalities in China and the EU. This has meant I've had to get hold of lots of Chinese datasets, some of which I have produced maps from - so I thought I'd post one or two here, along with some facts and figures. I should point out that most of the data I've been using has come from the National Bureau of Statistics of China website. 

Higher resolution version

In this 3D map I've just extruded the surface using population density data at a very local level. This required a reasonable amount of computing power but the effect is simply to emphasise the significant West/East split in population within China. This geographical division has been the topic of discussion for a long time and in relation to a number of areas but is generally referred to as the Hu Huanyong line (also sometimes the Hu line, Heihe-Tengchong Line or Aihui-Tengchong Line), after the Chinese population geographer of the same name. Strangely enough, there is a Facebook page dedicated to the Hu line. The line divides China roughly into two parts. In 1935 when Hu first identified the split, the West had 57% of the area and 4% of the population. Today, the East has 94% of the population of China, but only 43% of the area. You can see how this looks in the map below... 

I'm still working on my parts of the presentation but am really fascinated by the facts and figures emerging from the 2010 Chinese census and data for different regions of China. China accounts for almost exactly 20% of the world population and both Beijing and Shanghai (i.e. the provinces) have 20 million or more people. I still need to learn a lot more about China, Chinese data and regional development there generally but my work so far suggests that patterns of regional inequality - while different in absolute terms - are often strikingly similar to patterns of regional inequality in Europe. A good example of this is in Jiangsu province, to the north of Shanghai.

Citations: Center for International Earth Science Information Network - CIESIN - Columbia University, International Food Policy Research Institute - IFPRI, The World Bank, and Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical - CIAT. 2011. Global Rural-Urban Mapping Project, Version 1 (GRUMPv1): Population Density Grid. Palisades, NY: NASA Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC). http://dx.doi.org/10.7927/H4R20Z93. Accessed 10 June 2012.

Balk, D.L., U. Deichmann, G. Yetman, F. Pozzi, S. I. Hay, and A. Nelson. 2006. Determining Global Population Distribution: Methods, Applications and Data. Advances in Parasitology 62:119-156. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0065-308X(05)62004-0.

P.S. Thanks are due to Chunhua Liu for her insights here!

Inequality or Deprivation?

One thing I've been thinking about recently is the question of whether we should be interested in poverty/deprivation/disadvantage in particular or whether we should be concerned with inequality more generally. The latter is of course the big issue (interesting link) and more recently I've been interested in wider questions - some of which are captured in a new paper. With this in mind, I've taken the English deprivation data (i.e. IMD2010) and looked at it by local authority to see how many areas are within the 10% most and least deprived on this measure. Click on the image extract below for the full size chart...

Full size version

I've labelled some individual local authorities and have done this in absolute rather than percentage terms because I'm interested in both the level of inequality and the absolute number of 'poorer' or 'richer' areas in each local authority. Because Birmingham has by far the highest population it stands out but this chart is more about the internal differences in the number of areas in each local authority that are either in the most or least deprived decile in England and, therefore, the level of inequality.

A few final nuggets...

• Manchester has more than 100 areas within England's 10% most deprived, but no areas within England's 10% least deprived.

• Wokingham has nearly 70 areas within England's 10% least deprived, but no areas within England's 10% most deprived.

• Doncaster, Hackney, Haringey, Hull, Knowsley, Leicester, Newham, Nottingham, Sandwell, Tower Hamlets and Wolverhampton are among the areas with areas in the most deprived 10% but no areas in the least deprived 10%.

• Dover, Exeter, Gravesham, Nuneaton & Bedworth, and Thurrock all have equal numbers of areas in the least and most deprived 10% in England - though the total is quite low in each case.

Take a closer look at the chart to explore more - areas are arranged alphabetically to aid navigation. You'll have to zoom to see it in detail...