weet
~62-
D.
Population Trends and Projections
The population characteristics discussed above were extracted from
ya
feet,
Owes Aner
data compiled in the TT Census of 1973, the Trust Territory's last offi- ;
cial population enumeration.
When they are compared with data contained
in the 1967 TTPI Census a number of Significant changes in the size, com-
position, and distribution of Micronesia's population become evident.
In
the following Section, we establish these population "trends" (changes
—
between 1967 and 1973), and use them to project plausible patterns of future
growth.
Our projections assune, of course, that the components of future
population growth wil] continue to closely approximate the rates existing
between 1967 and 1973. 7/
The left-hand side of TableIV-6
contains the 1967 and 1973, TTPI
citizen populations of each district, and shows the average annual growth
rate for each district, as calculated using a formula based on the principle
of compound interest.
The table shows that between 1967 and 1973 ficranesia's population
grew at a very hign rate (3.6 percent annually); if this rate of growth
continues, the population will double from 1973 levels by 1993--a period of
only twenty years.
This extremely high rate of growth 18 dus primarily to
high rates of "natural increase'--in other words, most areas of the TTPI
have high birth rates and low
Table
V-6
death rates.
, which shows that all
This fact is reflected in
the districts of the Trust Territory,
q