Older women have the edge in Okanagan

If all the 60-year-old women in Kelowna got together, there’d be more of them than anyone else.

That’s the age and gender category with the largest number of members — 1,880 people, according to new census information from Statistics Canada.

As in past years, Kelowna’s population still skews a little greyer than the rest of Canada, reflecting its appeal as a retirement destination.

In fact, seniors now make up a slightly greater share of Kelowna’s population than they did five years ago.

Through the Central Okanagan, those who are aged 65 or older account for 22.6% of the population, up from 21.4% in 2015.

But that’s nowhere near the Canadian towns and cities with the highest proportion of seniors. The seven communities with the highest percentage of seniors are all in B.C., with most on Vancouver

Island and the only one in the Okanagan being Osoyoos, at 46%.

According to the new 2021 census data, the average age of a resident of the greater Kelowna area is 44.2 years old, compared to the national average of 41.9 years old.

The proportion of Kelowna residents who are 57 or older is higher than the national average at every age bracket; it’s comparable for those between 20 and 57; but it’s lower for children and teenagers.

For example, seven-tenths of one per cent of all Kelowna residents are age 30 — the exact same percentage as for the general Canadian population.

That equality reflects the strong in-migration Kelowna has experienced in recent years. Between 2016 and 2022, Kelowna was the fastest-growing city in Canada, with the population increasing 14%.

But, so far at least, many of those younger arrivals have not yet had children. Kids who are nine years old make up 0.5% of Kelowna’s population; they represent 0.6% of all Canadians.