BELMOPAN, Belize (CMC) – The Director General of the Statistical Institute of Belize (SIB), Diana Castillo-Trejo, says the country’s population has been growing at a “slower rate than was previously estimated” after the preliminary results of the 2022 census were released.

The SIB, earlier this week, released the preliminary findings of the census, showing that since 2010, the population had increased by just over 75,000, with the data showing that the population has been declining by a larger number each year.

“And what we can see here from the population series that has been revised for 2011 to 2021 is that one, our population has been growing at a slower rate than was previously estimated. We also see that the rate of growth for our population has been decelerating. We grow by less and less every year, and this is due in large part to declining fertility rates,” Castillo-Trejo said, noting that there has also been a decline in the number of people getting married in Belize.

“We also see some slight shifts with respect to marital status. So, the per cent of our population that reported that they had never been married for 2022, both males and females, was somewhere around 60 per cent,” she said.

Castillo-Trejo further explained that for males, 62 per cent said that they had never been married, while for females it was over 50 per cent.

Both categories were up a few percentage points from 2010, and this corresponded with a slight decrease in the number of people who reported that they had been married, the director general added.

However, she said that while there have been declining marriage rates, the number of people reported in common law partnerships has increased.

“Similarly, when we look at union status, there is a shift, a slight shift away from being married, living with a spouse, to common law living arrangements. So there’s a decrease in both males and females in the per cent of the population that reported that they were married and currently living with their spouse,” the Castillo-Trejo said.

She said that the decline in population is consistent with the trends observed in several other countries around the world.