| Type: | Package |
| Title: | UNHCR Refugee Population Statistics Database |
| Version: | 2024.12.0 |
| Description: | The Refugee Population Statistics Database published by The Office of The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) contains information about forcibly displaced populations spanning more than 70 years of statistical activities. It covers displaced populations such as refugees, asylum-seekers and internally displaced people, including their demographics. Stateless people are also included, most of who have never been displaced. The database also reflects the different types of solutions for displaced populations such as repatriation or resettlement. More information on the data and methodology can be found on the UNHCR Refugee Data Finder https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/. |
| URL: | https://populationstatistics.github.io/refugees/, https://github.com/PopulationStatistics/refugees |
| BugReports: | https://github.com/PopulationStatistics/refugees/issues |
| License: | CC BY 4.0 |
| LazyData: | true |
| LazyDataCompression: | xz |
| Depends: | R (≥ 3.5) |
| Imports: | tibble (≥ 3.2.0) |
| Suggests: | testthat (≥ 3.1.0) |
| RoxygenNote: | 7.3.2 |
| Encoding: | UTF-8 |
| Config/testthat/edition: | 3 |
| NeedsCompilation: | no |
| Packaged: | 2025-06-14 03:48:42 UTC; galal |
| Author: | Hisham Galal [aut, cre], Ahmadou Dicko [ctb], UNHCR [cph] |
| Maintainer: | Hisham Galal <galal@unhcr.org> |
| Repository: | CRAN |
| Date/Publication: | 2025-06-15 00:30:02 UTC |
refugees: UNHCR Refugee Population Statistics Database
Description
The Refugee Population Statistics Database published by The Office of The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) contains information about forcibly displaced populations spanning more than 70 years of statistical activities. It covers displaced populations such as refugees, asylum-seekers and internally displaced people, including their demographics. Stateless people are also included, most of who have never been displaced. The database also reflects the different types of solutions for displaced populations such as repatriation or resettlement. More information on the data and methodology can be found on the UNHCR Refugee Data Finder https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/.
Author(s)
Maintainer: Hisham Galal galal@unhcr.org
Other contributors:
Ahmadou Dicko mail@ahmadoudicko.com [contributor]
UNHCR [copyright holder]
See Also
Useful links:
Report bugs at https://github.com/PopulationStatistics/refugees/issues
Asylum Applications
Description
Asylum claims submitted by year and countries of asylum and origin. Claims are submitted by asylum applicants and are applications for international protection.
Usage
asylum_applications
Format
A tibble.
- year
The year (e.g. 2020).
- coo_name
Country of origin name.
- coo
Country of origin UNHCR code.
- coo_iso
Country of origin ISO code.
- coa_name
Country of asylum name.
- coa
Country of asylum UNHCR code.
- coa_iso
Country of asylum ISO code.
- procedure_type
The procedure type describes the authority with whom the asylum claim was lodged. It can be one of:
G– Government,J- Joint,U– UNHCR.- app_type
The application type describes the stage of the procedure. Common values are
N(New),R(Repeat) andA(Appeal).- dec_level
The decision level provides more detail of the stage of the procedure. Common values are
NA(New applications),RA(repeat/reopened applications) andAR(administrative review).- app_pc
The data type describes whether the data provided reflects cases or persons. The most common situation is for the data on asylum applications lodged to reflect persons, but in certain situations (e.g USA), the data provided by governments is at the level of cases. A case can contain information on one or more persons.
- applied
The total number of asylum claims for the given dataset.
Details
See the notes on the data structure in the methodology pages for more details.
Source
Examples
asylum_applications
Asylum Decisions
Description
Decisions taken on asylum claims by year and countries of asylum and origin. Asylum claims are applications for international protection and decisions on asylum claims can be positive, negative or otherwise closed.
Usage
asylum_decisions
Format
A tibble.
- year
The year (e.g. 2020).
- coo_name
Country of origin name.
- coo
Country of origin UNHCR code.
- coo_iso
Country of origin ISO code.
- coa_name
Country of asylum name.
- coa
Country of asylum UNHCR code.
- coa_iso
Country of asylum ISO code.
- procedure_type
The procedure type describes the authority with whom the asylum claim was lodged. It can be one of:
G– Government,J- Joint,U– UNHCR.- dec_level
The decision level provides more detail of the stage of the procedure. Common values are
NA(New applications),RA(repeat/reopened applications) andAR(administrative review).- dec_pc
The data type describes whether the data provided reflects cases or persons. The most common situation is for the data on asylum applications lodged to reflect persons, but in certain situations (e.g USA), the data provided by governments is at the level of cases. A case can contain information on one or more persons.
- dec_recognized
The number of asylum applicants recognised as refugees under UNHCR’s mandate.
- dec_other
The number of asylum applicants recognised as refugees under other forms of complementary protection.
- dec_rejected
The number of asylum applicants whose asylum claims have been rejected.
- dec_closed
The number of asylum applicants whose asylum claims have been otherwise closed.
- dec_total
The total number of asylum applicants for which a decision on their asylum claim has been made in the given reference period.
Details
See the notes on the data structure in the methodology pages for more details.
Source
Examples
asylum_decisions
Countries
Description
Country codes, names, UN major areas and UNHCR regional bureaux/operations.
Usage
countries
Format
A tibble.
- iso_code
ISO3 Country code.
- unhcr_code
UNHCR Country code.
- name
UNSD Name.
- unhcr_region
UNHCR Region name.
- unsd_region
UNSD Region name.
- unsd_subregion
UNSD Sub-region name.
- unsd_imregion
SDG Region name.
- sdg_region
SDG Region name.
Source
Examples
countries
Demographics
Description
Demographic and sub-national data, where such disaggregation is available. UNHCR collects this information for all population types, as well as two durable solutions (returned IDPs and refugees). Demographics are also available for IDMC and UNRWA datasets.
Usage
demographics
Format
A tibble.
- year
The year (e.g. 2020).
- coo_name
Country of origin name.
- coo
Country of origin UNHCR code.
- coo_iso
Country of origin ISO code.
- coa_name
Country of asylum name.
- coa
Country of asylum UNHCR code.
- coa_iso
Country of asylum ISO code.
- pop_type
The three character code specifying the population type (e.g.
REFfor refugees,ASYfor asylum-seekers etc).- location
The textual description of the location.
- loc_type
An indication of whether the location is urban or rural. An urban location is classified as a settlement with more than 5,000 inhabitants. It can be one of the following values:
C– Camp. Note thatCwas discontinued after 2010, at which point the accommodation type became available,U– Urban,R– Rural,V- Various/unknown- acc_type
Accommodation Type became available in 2010 but is only populated from 2012. The code represents one of:
I- Individual accommodation,S- Self-settled camp,P- Planned/managed camp,C- Collective centre,R- Reception/transit camp,U- Undefined- f_0_4
The number of female children aged 0 to 4 inclusive.
- f_5_11
The number of female children aged 5 to 11 inclusive.
- f_12_17
The number of female children aged 12 to 17 inclusive.
- f_18_59
The number of female adults aged 18 to 59 inclusive.
- f_60
The number of female adults aged 60 or more.
- f_other
The number of females for whom age disaggregation is unavailable.
- f_total
The total number of females (where disaggregation by sex is available).
- m_0_4
The number of male children aged 0 to 4 inclusive.
- m_5_11
The number of male children aged 5 to 11 inclusive.
- m_12_17
The number of male children aged 12 to 17 inclusive.
- m_18_59
The number of male adults aged 18 to 59 inclusive.
- m_60
The number of male adults aged 60 or more.
- m_other
The number of males for whom age disaggregation is unavailable.
- m_total
The total number of males (where disaggregation by sex is available).
- total
The total number of persons.
Details
See the notes on the data structure in the methodology pages for more details.
Source
Examples
demographics
Forced displacement flow dataset
Description
UNHCR has published a new dataset recording the number of people forced to flee during each of the years since 1962. This dataset presents the forced displacement flows.
Usage
flows
Format
A tibble.
- year
The year (e.g. 2020).
- coo_name
Country of origin name.
- coo
Country of origin UNHCR code.
- coo_iso
Country of origin ISO code.
- coa_name
Country of asylum name.
- coa
Country of asylum UNHCR code.
- coa_iso
Country of asylum ISO code.
- refugees
Refugee Arrivals: includes prima facie (group recognition) refugees and those who have received temporary protection. The first available data for this group is for 1962. People in refugee-like situations are also included from 2007.
- asylum_seekers
New Asylum Applications: are new asylum applications registered during each year. Repeat and appeal applications have been excluded. The first year that published data for this population group became available is 1970 and only for a limited number of high-income countries, with data from more countries available from 2000.
- returned_refugees
Refugees who have returned home within the previous year.
- oip
Other people in need of international protection: includes just the new arrivals of this population group, first reported in 2018.
Details
See the notes on the curation process in the Data Insights for more details.
Source
Examples
flows
IDMC Data
Description
Data on Internally displaced persons due to conflict and violence that is produced by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre.
Usage
idmc
Format
A tibble.
- year
The year (e.g. 2020).
- coo_name
Country of origin name.
- coo
Country of origin UNHCR code.
- coo_iso
Country of origin ISO code.
- coa_name
Country of asylum name.
- coa
Country of asylum UNHCR code.
- coa_iso
Country of asylum ISO code.
- total
The total number of internally displaced persons due to conflict and violence.
Details
See the notes on the data structure in the methodology pages for more details.
Source
Examples
idmc
Population figures
Description
UNHCR data on displacement at the end of the year.
Usage
population
Format
A tibble.
- year
The year (e.g. 2020).
- coo_name
Country of origin name.
- coo
Country of origin UNHCR code.
- coo_iso
Country of origin ISO code.
- coa_name
Country of asylum name.
- coa
Country of asylum UNHCR code.
- coa_iso
Country of asylum ISO code.
- refugees
The number of refugees.
- asylum_seekers
The number of asylum-seekers.
- returned_refugees
The number of returned refugees.
- idps
The number of internally displaced persons.
- returned_idps
The number of returned internally displaced persons.
- stateless
The number of stateless persons.
- ooc
The number of others of concern to UNHCR.
- oip
The number of other people in need of international protection.
- hst
The number of host community members.
Details
See the notes on the data structure in the methodology pages for more details.
Source
Examples
population
Solutions
Description
Data on solutions record those refugees and IDPs that have availed a durable solution.
Usage
solutions
Format
A tibble.
- year
The year (e.g. 2020).
- coo_name
Country of origin name.
- coo
Country of origin UNHCR code.
- coo_iso
Country of origin ISO code.
- coa_name
Country of asylum name.
- coa
Country of asylum UNHCR code.
- coa_iso
Country of asylum ISO code.
- returned_refugees
The number of refugee returnees.
- resettlement
The number of resettlement arrivals.
- naturalisation
The number of refugees that have naturalised.
- returned_idps
The number of IDP returnees.
Details
See the notes on the data structure in the methodology pages for more details.
Source
Examples
solutions
UNRWA data
Description
Data on Palestine refugees registered under UNRWA’s mandate.
Usage
unrwa
Format
A tibble.
- year
The year (e.g. 2020).
- coo_name
Country of origin name.
- coo
Country of origin UNHCR code.
- coo_iso
Country of origin ISO code.
- coa_name
Country of asylum name.
- coa
Country of asylum UNHCR code.
- coa_iso
Country of asylum ISO code.
- total
The total number of Palestine refugees registered under UNRWA’s mandate.
Details
See the notes on the data structure in the methodology pages for more details.
Source
Examples
unrwa