TOTAL POPULATION

11.05 Definition:

On a given date, the total population of a country consists of all persons, national or foreign, who are permanently settled in the economic territory of the country, even if they are temporarily absent from it. For some purposes, an annual average of head counts will provide an appropriate basis for estimating national accounts variables or for use as a denominator in comparisons.

11.06 Total population is defined for national accounts according to the concept of residence (see units and grouping of units chapter).

A person who is staying, or intends to stay, on the economic territory of the country for a period of one year or more is regarded as permanently settled there.

A person is regarded as being temporarily absent if he or she is permanently settled in the country but is staying, or intends to stay, in the rest of the world for a period of less than one year.

All individuals who belong to the same household are resident where the household has a centre of economic interest: this is where the household maintains a dwelling, or succession of dwellings, which members of the household treat, and use, as their principal residence. A member of a resident household continues to be a resident even if that individual makes frequent journeys outside the economic territory, because its centre of economic interest remains in the economy in which the household is resident.

11.07 The total population of a country includes:

  1. nationals settled in the country;
  2. national civilians who are staying abroad for a period of less than one year (frontier workers, seasonal workers, tourists, patients, etc.);
  3. foreign civilians settled in the country for a period of one year or more (including the personnel of the Institutions of the European Communities and of international civilian organisations located within the geographic territory of the country);
  4. foreign military personnel working with international military organisations located within the geographic territory of the country;
  5. foreign technical assistance personnel on long-term assignments who work in the country and are deemed to be employed by their host government on behalf of the government, or international organisation, which is actually financing their work.

By convention, the total population also includes the following, irrespective of the length of their stay outside the country:

  1. national students however long they study abroad;
  2. members of the country's armed forces stationed in the rest of the world;
  3. nationals who are on the staff of national scientific bases established outside the geographic territory of the country;
  4. nationals who are on the staff of diplomatic missions abroad;
  5. nationals who are members of the crews of fishing boats, other ships, aircraft and floating platforms operating partly, or wholly, outside the economic territory.
11.08 Conversely, the total population of a country does not include:
  1. foreign civilians staying on the territory for less than a year (frontier workers, seasonal workers, tourists, patients, etc.);
  2. national civilians staying abroad for a period of one year or more;
  3. national military personnel working with international organisations located in the rest of the world;
  4. national technical assistance personnel on long-term assignments who work abroad and are deemed to be employed by their host government on behalf of the government, or international organisation, which is actually financing their work

and also, by convention:

  1. foreign students however long they study in the country;
  2. members of the armed forces of a foreign country who are stationed in the country;
  3. the foreign personnel of foreign scientific bases located on the geographic territory of the country;
  4. members of foreign diplomatic missions stationed in the country.

11.09 The definition given above differs from the present (or de facto) population, which consists of persons actually present on the geographic territory of a country at a given date.