THE CENTRAL STATISTICS Office has released a treasure trove of new stats, if you’re into that kind of thing, which they’re calling the Statistical Yearbook of Ireland 2016.

It’s precisely what it sounds like and offers a fascinating snapshot of Ireland by the numbers.

All the data is from the CSO’s number crunching from the most recent full year, that’s 2015.

Here’s a selection of some of the most interesting facts.

Population

Source: Sam Boal/Photocall Ireland

The CSO says that the population of the Republic of Ireland last year stood at 4.76 million people.

The CSO compares this to the pre-famine census of 1841 which showed that the  area comprising the Republic of Ireland had 6.5 million people.

As this graph shows, Munster was the most populous province in 1841 until Leinster raced ahead since the turn of the 20th century.

Source: CSO.ie

Marriages

Bride Kaniah Cusack after her wedding to Matthew Farrell in O'Donoghue's pub on Baggot St, Dublin. (September 2015) Source: Mark Stedman

The CSO stats show that there were 22,116 marriages in 2015, including 91 same-sex marriages. This is the most amount of marriages since 2008.

The stats also show that average age of brides and grooms continues to rise.  Last year, the average age of grooms and brides was 35.3 years and 33.2 years respectively.

The CSO also measures marriage ceremonies, religious or otherwise. This is what they found for 2015.

Source: CSO.ie

Crime

Source: Mark Stedman/RollingNews.ie

The stats on crime for 2015 show that murders were down for the second consecutive year but reported sexual assaults and attempted murders increased for the third straight year.

Transport

Source: Eamonn Farrell/RollingNews.ie

Last year saw the highest number of new cars licensed since 2008. A total of 121,110 new private cars licensed in 2015, a 31.1% year-on-year increase.

Unsurprisingly, the county with the greatest number of new cars licensed was in Dublin at 54,021.

This graphic shows, however, that most counties had over 5,000 new cars licensed throughout last year.

Source: CSO.ie

Holidays

Source: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews.ie

Irish people collectively took over 7 million overnight trips abroad last year.

This figure includes travel for both holidays and business with the average time spent abroad on these trips totalling 7.7 nights.

The time spent abroad varied greatly depending on where the travel was to.

The average length of stay on outbound trips was 6.6 nights within the European Union, 13.9 nights in North America and 25.7 nights in Oceania.

The stats also show that people are holidaying more within Ireland.

Source: CSO.ie

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