Measuring Urbanization Using Global Human Settlement Layers and Gridded Population Data

Nawaj Sarif, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)

The primary data source on urbanization is the country's official census data collected at certain intervals. The census datasets are often not available on time. For instance, in India, the last census was conducted 14 years ago. In this context, an alternative measure for urbanization is essential. Hence, this study aims to measure urbanization level using Global Human Settlement Layers and gridded population data for countries in South Asia and verify the estimate with World Urbanization Prospects (WUP). The result shows the gridded data-based estimate is slightly underestimated as WUP reported the level of urbanization in South Asia as 32.7 in 2010 and 37.1 percent in 2020, whereas this study reports 30.1 percent in 2010 and 34.6 percent in 2020. Country-wise estimates align closely with WUP for India, but overestimate urbanization in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh and underestimate it in Bhutan and Pakistan. This study highlights the usefulness of the gridded data-based estimates of urbanization level over the traditional measures since it can be used as a universal tool to measure urbanization and understand the global urbanization dynamic. Additionally, the proposed methods and findings of this study can aid in efficient urban planning and sustainable urban management.

Keywords: Data and Methods, Geo-referenced/geo-coded data, Geographic Information Systems (GIS)

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