139 Data Visualization: Mongolia
Population and Area by Administrative Unit
mykel2
For my data visualization project, I wanted to graphically represent the unevenness of population dispersal and density within Mongolia. Mongolia is made up of 21 provinces and one provincial municipality, the city of Ulaanbaatar. I found 2010 Mongolian census data showing the population of Mongolia’s administrative units alongside the area of each space as of 2010, and I decided to record this data in Excel and use it to create two doughnut charts. One doughnut chart shows a population breakdown of Mongolia by administrative unit, and the other shows the breakdown of Mongolian area by province/provincial municipality. Both charts use the same color key. I chose to use a doughnut chart because doughnut charts are easily readable visualizers which show proportions of a whole, and in this case, the chart type allows viewers to intuitively understand how populations and areas relate to one another within the nation of Mongolia. I believe that the two charts I made are most impactful when viewed alongside each other, as viewing them in tandem allows viewers to make interesting conclusions about population density–the size of Ulaanbaatar’s portion of the graph (shown in bright red) is significantly larger in the chart which compares population than the chart which compares area. Thus, viewers can conclude that although Ulaanbaatar is quite small in comparison to Mongolia’s provinces, it contains a disproportionately large percent of Mongolia’s population. This visualization aims to encourage readers to further research Ulaanbaatar’s growing population density and the effects of urbanization on residents of Mongolia.
Data Reference:
Mongolia, Administrative Units, Extended
GeoHive, http://www.geohive.com/cntry/mongolia_ext.aspx. Accessed via archive.today, https://archive.ph/20151115104348/http://www.geohive.com/cntry/mongolia_ext.aspx. Accessed on 03 March 2023.
