Media Contact: Lovett 202/343-7445
For Immediate Release: March 18, 1982

The Bureau of Indian Affairs has published an updated report on American Indian reservations populations. The booklet includes estimates on unemployment.

Dated December, 1981, the report shows a population of 734,895 living on or near Indian reservations, including former reservations in Oklahoma. It also includes 64,047 Eskimos, Aleuts and Indians in Alaska.

The reservation population, which constitutes the BIA's service population, is 52 percent of the 1.4 million total Indian population counted in the 1980 census.

Unemployment on the reservations is reported to be 31 percent of the labor force.

The information in the report is presented by states, BIA area offices, agencies and individual reservations.

The data was compiled from information provided by BIA field offices.

The BIA's last report on reservation populations, in 1979, showed a total of 681,213 with a 27 percent unemployment rate.