Three quarter of Northern population own houses

Rasika Somarathna

Almost 75 percent of the Northern population live in a shelter owned by a member of their household, according to the report on Enumeration of Vital Events (EVE 2011) in the Northern province compiled by the Department of Census and Statistics (DCS).

The statistics is on par with the rest of the country when it comes to data pertaining to the above matter.

The EVE -2011 states that a further 12.5 percent of the households live in units free of any rent payment.

The Eve - 2011 also has found out that the average household size, generally attributed to cultural and economic characteristics of different social domains, is a robust 3.98 persons per household for the North in 2011.

The report in its section on households states that over 98 percent of the Northern population spend the night in housing units and there are 245,694 such households in the province.

According to the report, 70 percent of the households in all districts in the Northern Province own a house. House ownership is approximately 90 percent among Kilinochchi households. The amount of households under encroached category is less than one percent in all the districts.

The data clearly reflect the progress made in areas of building new houses, renovating damaged ones and resettling the displaced in their own native areas, since the end of the conflict.

When it comes to overall figures in house ownership in the country the percentage is around 78 percent.

The Department of Census and Statistics states that in the country as a whole, most of the households in occupied housing units, is owned by a member of the household (82.1 percent); 7.0 percent households live rent free and 5.8 percent live in rented / leased housing units.

While owner occupied housing units are predominate in the urban and rural sectors (69.2 percent and 88.0 percent) most of the households in the estate sector live on rent free basis (63.3 percent).

In estates, it is very common to provide line rooms for its workers free of rent. The project of Enumeration of Vital events - in the Northern Province was carried out by the DCS commencing on June 10 to August 15, 2011.