PUTRAJAYA: Malaysia’s population is expected to grow by 400,000 to 32.4 million this year – an annual growth rate of 1.1 per cent.
The figure was released yesterday by the Department of Statistics, which also revealed that the country’s male population now outnumbers females by as much as one million.
“The male population stands at 16.7 million, while the female population is at 15.7 million. The sex ratio remains at 107 males per 100 females,” chief statistician of Malaysia, Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Uzir Mahidin said in a statement.
He said the findings were based on the Current Population Estimates Malaysia 2018, which presents mid-year population estimations for the period of 2017 and 2018.
“The statistic is also based on Population and Housing Census 2010 data, which takes into account three major components of population change: deaths, births and net migration,” he added.
Mohd Uzir said the percentage of Malaysians below the age of 14 has decreased from 24.1 per cent in 2017 to 23.8 per cent this year.
“On the other hand, the population of those between the ages of 15 and 64 (working age Malaysians) increased from 69.6 per cent in 2017 to 69.7 per cent in 2018.
“The percentage of those aged 65 and above increased from 6.3 per cent to 6.5 per cent for the same period.
“The increase in the composition of the working age population as well as the old age population contributed to the increase in the median age in 2018, which stands at 28.6 years,” Mohd Uzir added.
“(As for race, the number of) Bumiputeras (Malays and indigenous communities) increased by 0.3 per cent this year and account for 69.1 per cent of the total population.
“The composition of Chinese and Indians took a 0.2 and 0.1 per cent dip respectively, however” he said.