Upper East

The Upper East Region is located in northern part of  Ghana and is the second smallest of 10 administrative regions in Ghana, occupying a total land surface of 8,842 square kilometers or 2.7 per cent of the total land area of Ghana.

Location

The Upper East Region is located in Ghana’s northern region and is the second smallest of the country’s ten administrative regions, with 8,842 square kilometers or 2.7 percent of the country’s total geographical area.

The Upper East region is bordered on the north by Burkina Faso and on the east by Togo. It is located between 0° and 1° West longitude and latitudes 10° 30’N and 11°N. Burkina Faso is to the north, Togo is to the east, the Upper West Region is to the west, and the Northern Region is to the south. The Upper East is divided into 15 districts, each of which has its own district chief executive.

Brief History

The Upper East Region was historically part of what was once the Upper Region (Upper East and Upper West), which was formed out of the Northern Region on July 1, 1960. During the Provisional National Defence Council’s government in 1983, the Upper Region was separated into Upper East and Upper West (PNDC). The process began in 1980, when the current Upper East was managed as an autonomous Region on a trial basis, with Wa serving as the East Regional Municipal.

The Upper East Region’s capital, Bolgatanga, is home to the region’s population center.

The population is mostly rural (79%) and spread out in various villages. In 1984, 87.1 percent of the population lived in rural areas, compared to 84.3 percent in 2000. Between 1984 and 2000, the rural share of the population fell by 2.8 percentage points, and between 2000 and 2010, it fell by another 5.3 percent.

The region is the least urbanized in Ghana, with approximately 21% of the people living in cities. In fact, these are the only two regions in the country with less than 20% urban population, together with the Upper West.

Ghanaians make up 92.5 percent of the population of the Upper East region, whether by birth, childhood, or parenthood. Naturalized Ghanaians account for 5.3 percent of the population.