Description

GEO1_LR identifies the household's county within Liberia in all sample years. Counties are the first level administrative units of the country. GEO1_LR is spatially harmonized to account for political boundary changes across census years. Some detail is lost in harmonization; see the comparability discussion. A GIS map (in shapefile format), corresponding to GEO1_LR can be downloaded from the GIS Boundary files page in the IPUMS International web site.

The full set of geography variables for Liberia can be found in the IPUMS International Geography variables list. For cross-national geographic analysis on the first and second major administrative level refer to GEOLEV1, and GEOLEV2. More information on IPUMS-International geography can be found here.

Comparability — General

Where boundaries changed over time, units were harmonized to create units with boundaries that remain stable over time. Where officially-defined counties have populations under 20,000, they have been regionalized (combined) with neighboring counties.

• In 1974, Sasstown Territory is recorded separately even though the territory is supposed to be part of Maryland.
• Rivercess is also recorded separately from Bong County in 1974 even though it split from Grand Bassa County around 1985.
• Grand Kru and Margibi counties were both created in 1984 from Maryland; although the census separately records these in 1974.
• In 1984, Bomi territory was promoted to county, thus splitting it from Montserrado County.
• In 2000, River Gee was created from Gran Gedeh
• In 2001, Gbarpolu was created from Lofa.

Universe

Availability

• Liberia: 1974, 2008