Demographics of Guyana

Demographics Of Guyana

This article is about the demographic features of Guyana, including population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population.

Guyana's population (Guyanese people) is made up of five main ethnic groups: Amerindians, Africans, Indians, Europeans, and Chinese. Ninety percent of the inhabitants live on the narrow coastal plain, where population density is more than 115 inhabitants per square kilometre (300 /sq mi). The population density for Guyana as a whole is low: less than four inhabitants per square kilometre (10.4 /sq mi).

Although the government has provided free education from nursery school to the university level since 1975, it has not allocated sufficient funds to maintain the standards of what had been considered the best educational system in the region. Many school buildings are in poor condition, there is a shortage of text and exercise books, the number of teachers has declined, and fees are being charged at the university level for some courses of study for the first time.

Guyana continues to be influenced by British culture as well distantly with the cultures of the United States, Europe, Africa, the Islamic world, East and South Asian countries, and Latin America, esp. with neighboring countries of Venezuela and Brazil. It is one of three countries and two territories to form The Guianas, such as Suriname and the island of Trinidad and Tobago; and territories like the French Guiana and parts of neighboring countries named for Guayana (Venezuela) and Amapa of Brazil.

There is an organization dedicated to the integration of Guyana with the United States, GuyanaUSA. Their claim is based on the idea that Guyana has strong connections with the United States in terms of people (100,000 people have joint Guyanese American citizenship and 350,000 Guyanese live in the U.S., half as many as remain in Guyana).