Russian population: Russia’s population will decrease by more than one million people by 2021.
Moscow:
Statistics agency Rosstat reported on Friday that Russia’s population will drop by more than a million people by 2021, a historic drop not seen since the fall of the Soviet Union.
The ongoing demographic problems have been exacerbated by the Rosstat pandemic with figures showing more than 660,000 people have died from the coronavirus since health officials recorded the first case in the country.
The new figures continue a downward trend from the previous year when Russia’s population fell by more than half a million people.
The monthly Covid-related death figures published by Rosstat are much higher than those published by a separate government website, which tracks the pandemic in the country.
The figures on the government website only take into account deaths when the virus is considered the main cause of death after an autopsy and show only a total of 329,443 deaths.
The divergence has led to criticism that the Russian government has downplayed the severity of the pandemic in one of the countries hardest hit by pandemics in the world.
Russia has struggled to contain the pandemic due to a slow vaccination campaign, restrictive measures and widespread non-compliance with wearing masks in public places.
The pandemic death toll exacerbates the demographic crisis, linked to low birth rates and short life expectancy, that Russia has faced over the past 30 years.
The birth rate fell because the parenting generation was born in the 1990s, when the birth rate dropped due to economic turmoil following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The number of births per woman stands at about 1.5, far short of the 2.1 minimum needed for population renewal.
Economic concerns
Russia’s shrinking population has been at the top of President Vladimir Putin’s domestic agenda since he came to power more than two decades ago.
In his speeches to the nation, Putin regularly encourages Russians to have more children and live healthier to increase life expectancy.
The government has introduced a number of financial incentives for parents with more than one child, such as cash bonuses and favorable mortgage rates.
During his annual press conference last December, Putin stressed that 146 million people were not enough for the country from a “geopolitical point of view” and left a labor shortage.
He added that it was important to show that it was a “joy to have children” and that “there is no greater happiness in life and in the world”.
“The demographic crisis is certainly a failure of state policies,” said Sergei Zakharov, a demographer at the Moscow-based Higher School of Economics.
He told AFP that measures to increase the birth rate encourage families to have children earlier but do not change the total number of children they want to have.
He said the government’s influence on birth rates was “limited” and that shifting births to an earlier period would lead to a “demographic gap” in the future.
For Stepan Goncharov of the Levada Center independent pollster, low birth rates are associated with widespread “uncertainty about the future”.
The standard of living in Russia has steadily deteriorated since 2014, with an economy strained by continued Western sanctions, dependence on the oil and gas sector and widespread corruption.
“People are not stopping buying and their income and savings have decreased,” says Goncharov.
According to a survey last year by recruitment website SuperJob, 43% of Russians have no savings.
“People don’t put money aside and don’t plan for the family’s future,” Goncharov added.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from the syndication feed.)
