Mozambique: Languages

All data is drawn from the 2017 and 2007 government census results and is therefore subject to any limitations or distortions of the source data. Census documentation does not provide a definition of mother tongue, though does assert that the mother tongue of most of the population remains the most widely used in their daily communication. Typically mother tongue refers to the language that an individual is first exposed to in their early childhood, or in some cases to the dominant language of their ethnic group. The methodology by which illiteracy and ability to speak Portuguese were measured is also unknown. In some cases data was re-normalised due to errors in census documents (eg. percentage data did not total 100%). Language shares below 0.1% of an area population have been discarded. As a result, languages may not be present at higher administrative levels. This is particularly evident at admin 0 level. All decimal values have been rounded to a maximum of 3 decimal places.