Islam by country · Americas
Islam in Jamaica: history and Muslim population data
Explore CoMPS research on the historical journey of Islam in Jamaica, alongside population data and an interactive timeline.
Open Jamaica in the interactive map
History of Islam in Jamaica
It was seized by the British in 1655 and gained its independence from the UK in 1962. It consists of one main island with area of 10,991 sq km and its map is presented in Figure 5.5.6. The first Muslims arrived here from India under the British indentured labor system in the second half of the nineteenth century. In 1845, the first ship arrived with 261 people from India. Census data indicate that the number of Muslims increased from 672 or 0.1% in 1911, to 2,238 or 0.1% in 1982, but decreased to 1,024 or 0.04% in 2001 and then increased to 1,513 or 0.06% in 2011.
Thus, assuming that the percentage of Muslims will continue to increase by 0.02 of a percentage point per decade; then the Muslim population is expected to remain less than four thousand or 0.2% throughout this century.
Historical Muslim population dataset for Jamaica
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.
| Year | Total population (thousands) | Muslim population (thousands) | Muslim share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1900 | 755.7 | 0.529 | 0.07% |
| 2000 | 2,605 | 1.04 | 0.04% |
| 2100 | 911.4 | 2.19 | 0.24% |
For the full time series and visualisation, use the interactive map above.