Chapter 8 Per cent of refugee population Figure 23 | Per cent of refugees living in privately hosted individual accommodation | 2011-2018 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 ‘11 ‘12 ‘13 ‘14 population was female and 41 per cent was under the age of 18 in 2018 (although the data coverage was also very poor in this region so the estimates are indicative only). In contrast, the highest proportion of both women and children was in sub-Saharan Africa with 52 per cent and 57 per cent respectively. Location characteristics Knowing where displaced people are and how they are living is as important as knowing who they are when it comes to delivering assistance and protection. UNHCR requests geographically disaggregated data on populations of concern from its office, partners and governments, and classifies locations into urban and rural localities (as well as a various/unknown category, which includes locations that are a mix of urban and rural or where the categorization is unclear). Additionally, UNHCR collects data on the type of accommodation in which individuals reside, especially for refugee populations. This information is important for efficient policymaking and programme design. Accommodation types are classified as planned/managed camp, self-settled camp, collective centre, reception/transit camp and individual accommodation (private), as well as various/unknown if the information is not known, is unclear or does not fit in any of the other categories. A special section on page 56 discusses in more details trends in refugees living in urban areas. Disaggregated data by location at the subnational level is collected by UNHCR, and they are critical for 62 ‘15 ‘16 ‘17 ‘18 policymaking and delivering assistance. However, the extent of these data was variable. Altogether for 2018, UNHCR had data on location at the subnational level for 60 per cent of the total population of concern, a small increase from 2017 when it was 59 per cent. There was disaggregated information available for some 56 per cent of the refugee population and 69 per cent of the IDP population, but only 25 per cent of asylum-seekers. Reporting on IDPs has relatively good sub-national data at the regional level. Accommodation type was known for some 18.1 million refugees, about 89 per cent of the global total in 2018, an increase from the 85 per cent reported in 2017. The majority of refugees lived in privately hosted and out-of-camp individual accommodation (60 per cent) at the end of 2018, a proportion that has been stable since 2014 with variation of only a few percentage points [Figure 23]. Many countries, especially highand middle-income, reported all refugees living in individual accommodation. In contrast, there were also countries where most refugees were reported as living in some kind of camp setting such as Bangladesh, Tanzania, South Sudan, Ethiopia and Nigeria. This trend is seen when examined by country of origin. The Syrian refugees were overwhelmingly an out-of-camp population, with more than 98 per cent living in individual accommodation. Afghan refugees were also likely to be in individual accommodation with 80 per cent of the population doing so. In contrast, only 8 per cent of the South Sudanese refugee population lived in individual accommodation in 2018, as did just 6 per cent of Sudanese refugees. ■ unhcr > Global trends 2018