Key Indicators of Gumla District
Gumla district is predominantly a backward district as compared to other district of the State, besides having rich natural resources and climatic conditions. Some of the basic indicators such as human, economic and infrastructure are describe below:-
HUMAN
The district has total population of 706489 and total families of 133131. Out of 133131 families 99512 families live below poverty line i.e. they are BPL families, as per survey conducted in the year 1997. It shows that the poverty ratios are 74.75%. There are only 1929 skilled workers in the district. The details are annexed as annexure-III. The birth rate of Gumla district as per 2001 census is 32.6 per thousand and death rate is 16.0 per thousand. Therefore percentage of decadal growth rate for 1991-2001 is 16.60 which was 13.44 for 1981-91 against the state average of 23.19 in 1991-2001 and 24.03 in 1981-91. The main cause of low decadal growth rate is high death rate prevalent in these areas due to various reasons.
The infant mortality rate is 18 per thousand and the maternal mortality rate is 3.8 per thousand.
The main cause of high death rate is due to high intake of the country made liquor among rural people and various endemic diseases like Malaria, TB etc. The entire area is Malaria Prone Zone. Several cases of death are reported due to Malaria every year
Diarrhea is also prevalent in these areas.
ECONOMIC
Out of 133131 families, about 99512 families are below poverty line as per survey conducted for 1997-2002 five-year plan. Therefore, it is obvious that the majority of the families do not earn enough to provide basic economic necessities to their families. The average income of a family would be around 10000-15000 per annum.
The main economy of the district depends upon agriculture, forest produce, cattle development, mining activities and other commercial activities. Agriculture is in very primitive stage in rural area due to lack of irrigation facilities, scientific inputs, marketing, infrastructure etc. Statistic shows that out of 3.296 lakh hectare of cultivable land only 22056 hectares of land is irrigated. Therefore agriculture is mainly dependent on rain. District has average rainfall of 1000-1100 mm but due to lack of rain water harvesting techniques most of the rainy water is not utilised.