Africa Population Density Model (Land Degradation Project), 1992

The estimated population densities are expressed on a regularly spaced latitude/longitude raster grid covering Africa with an approximate resolution of 10 km x 10 km at the Equator. The data set which is an assessment of one of the factors causing soil degradation, namely the spatial distribution and density of population.

It was developed for the GEMS/UNITAR Africa Database and later used for GLASOD. The data sources include: 600 African towns and cities with figures standardized to 1988 values ( a combination of 479 cities from Birkbeck College and 363 cities in 51 African countries from PC Globe 3.0); UNEP/FAO population data from the 1984 Africa database; the Sierra Club Wilderness Area IUCN Protected Areas, used to delimit areas with extremely sparse populations and treated as having a density of less than one person per square kilometer.