New Perspectives for Mapping Global Population Distribution Using World Settlement Footprint Products

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Abstract

In the production of gridded population maps, remotely sensed, human settlement datasets rank among the most important geographical factors to estimate population densities and distributions at regional and global scales. Within this context, the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) has developed a new suite of global layers, which accurately describe the built-up environment and its characteristics at high spatial resolution: (i) the World Settlement Footprint 2015 layer (WSF-2015), a binary settlement mask; and (ii) the experimental World Settlement Footprint Density 2015 layer (WSF-2015-Density), representing the percentage of impervious surface. This research systematically compares the effectiveness of both layers for producing population distribution maps through a dasymetric mapping approach in nine low-, middle-, and highly urbanised countries. Results indicate that the WSF-2015-Density layer can produce population distribution maps with higher qualitative and quantitative accuracies in comparison to the already established binary approach, especially in those countries where a good percentage of building structures have been identified within the rural areas. Moreover, our results suggest that population distribution accuracies could substantially improve through the dynamic preselection of the input layers and the correct parameterisation of the Settlement Size Complexity (SSC) index.

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Population Distribution, Settlement Patterns and Accessibility across Africa in 2010

Catherine Linard, Marius Gilbert, Robert W. Snow … (2012)

The spatial distribution of populations and settlements across a country and their interconnectivity and accessibility from urban areas are important for delivering healthcare, distributing resources and economic development. However, existing spatially explicit population data across Africa are generally based on outdated, low resolution input demographic data, and provide insufficient detail to quantify rural settlement patterns and, thus, accurately measure population concentration and accessibility. Here we outline approaches to developing a new high resolution population distribution dataset for Africa and analyse rural accessibility to population centers. Contemporary population count data were combined with detailed satellite-derived settlement extents to map population distributions across Africa at a finer spatial resolution than ever before. Substantial heterogeneity in settlement patterns, population concentration and spatial accessibility to major population centres is exhibited across the continent. In Africa, 90% of the population is concentrated in less than 21% of the land surface and the average per-person travel time to settlements of more than 50,000 inhabitants is around 3.5 hours, with Central and East Africa displaying the longest average travel times. The analyses highlight large inequities in access, the isolation of many rural populations and the challenges that exist between countries and regions in providing access to services. The datasets presented are freely available as part of the AfriPop project, providing an evidence base for guiding strategic decisions.

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Determining global population distribution: methods, applications and data.

D Balk, U Deichmann, G Yetman … (2006)

Evaluating the total numbers of people at risk from infectious disease in the world requires not just tabular population data, but data that are spatially explicit and global in extent at a moderate resolution. This review describes the basic methods for constructing estimates of global population distribution with attention to recent advances in improving both spatial and temporal resolution. To evaluate the optimal resolution for the study of disease, the native resolution of the data inputs as well as that of the resulting outputs are discussed. Assumptions used to produce different population data sets are also described, with their implications for the study of infectious disease. Lastly, the application of these population data sets in studies to assess disease distribution and health impacts is reviewed. The data described in this review are distributed in the accompanying DVD.