Islam in Barbados: history and Muslim population data

History of Islam in Barbados

This island was first visited by the Portuguese who founded uninhabited and named it Los Barbados, from the number of bearded fig trees which they found, and then they abandoned it. It was then claimed by the British in 1625 and gained its independence from the UK in 1966. It consists of one island with an area of 430 sq km and its map is presented in Figure 5.1.2. The first Muslims were indentured labor brought from India in the nineteenth century and were estimated to be fifteen Bengalis in 1921.

The Muslim population increased from none in 1871, to one in 1911, to 58 or 0.03% in 1946, to 336 or 0.1% in 1960, to 773 or 0.3% in 1980, to 1,047 or 0.4% in 1990, to 1,657 or 0.7% in 2000, to 1,605 or 0.7% in 2010.

Thus, assuming that the percentage of Muslims will increase by a tenth of a percentage point each decade; then the Muslim population is expected to remain less than 4,000 throughout this century.

Historical Muslim population dataset for Barbados

The figures below are from the CoMPS historical dataset. Population values are expressed in thousands; 2100 is a modelled projection, not a present-day count.

For the full time series and visualisation, use the interactive map above.