2 July 2009
Maputo — The population of the western Mozambican province of Tete grew by 56 per cent between the censuses of 1997 and 2007, or at an average annual rate of 5.6 per cent.
This is more than double the national growth rate of 2.4 per cent a year, established by the 2007 census.
According to the definitive figures from the census, released in Tete in June, the province had 1,783,767 inhabitants on 1 August 2007. Ten years previously, the figure was 1,144,604.
Almost half the Tete population (49.7 per cent) is under 15 years old. 47.4 per cent are aged between 15 and 64, and just 2.9 per cent are aged 65 and above.
The province is not highly urbanized. The provincial capital, Tete City, only has 155,870 inhabitants, or 8.7 per cent of the province's total population. Nonetheless, this is a sharp increase on the city's 1997 population of 101,984. The most populous area is the fertile district of Angonia, with 298,815 people (16.8 per cent of the total).
But the sharpest growth has been in Moatize district, which lies on the road from Tete City to the Malawian border, where the population has risen by well over 100 per cent, from 109,103 in 1997 to 215,092 ten years later. Moatize has enormous coal deposits - but the population rise cannot be attributed to people flocking into the district looking for mining jobs, since the main companies with coal concessions (Vale of Brazil and Riversdale of Australia) have not yet begun their mining operations.
The illiteracy rate in Tete has fallen, but not as sharply as in other provinces in the central region. 66.8 per cent of the adult population was illiterate in 1997, and that figure fell to 56.2 per cent in 2007. But in the neighbouring provinces of Sofala and Manica, the illiteracy rates were down to 43.3 and 43 per cent respectively.
Illiteracy is gender structured throughout Mozambique. In Tete, 39.3 per cent of men were unable to read or write, but the figure soared to 71.5 per cent among women.
The main language spoken in Tete is Nyanja, with 46.5 per cent giving it as their mother tongue, followed by Nyungue (27.5 per cent), and Sena (11.4 per cent). Very similar percentages said these were the main languages they spoke at home. Typically of the Mozambican countryside, very few people habitually speak the official language, Portuguese. Less than five per cent gave Portuguese as their mother tongue.
84.8 per cent of the economically active population in Tete work in the primary sector (agriculture, forestry, fishing and mining). This is overwhelmingly subsistence agriculture, since coal mining has yet to take off.
Despite the presence of the Cahora Bassa dam, only 3.9 per cent work in the secondary sector (manufacturing industry, energy and construction), while the remaining 11.1 per cent work in transport, finance and other services.
Although Tete is home to the country's major electricity asset, in the shape of Cahora Bassa, only 4.9 per cent of Tete households have electricity (up from 2.9 per cent in 1997). 53 per cent light their homes with kerosene lamps, while for the poorest 34 per cent of households wood fuel is their sole source of energy, including for lighting.
In the ten years between the censuses, little progress was made in water supply. The number of households enjoying a piped water supply rose from 4.2 to 4.8 per cent. 6.5 per cent relied on communal stand pipes, 21.5 per cent drew their water from a protected well or borehole, while 40 per cent were supplied from traditional wells without so much as a hand pump. 26.5 per cent took their water directly from the Zambezi river or from other rivers and lakes.
The number of households lacking the simplest of durable goods confirms that Tete is indeed a very poor province. Less than half of all households (49.9 per cent) have a radio. The figure is 65.1 per cent in Sofala and 57.4 per cent in Manica.
3.7 per cent of households owned a television and only 0.2 per cent had a computer. As for means of transport, 0.8 per cent of households owned a car, 1.2 per cent had motorbikes, and 41.5 per cent owned a bicycle.
But 38.3 per cent of Tete households owned none of these durable goods at all. This poorest stratum accounts for 34.1 per cent of households in Manica and only 12 per cent in Sofala.
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