- "The population today stands at around 144 million,
but that is due to drop to 101 million by 2050, and to 55 million by 2075."
-
- Will the last person to leave Russia please turn out
the lights.
-
- It is the largest country on earth, with extraordinary
natural wealth, but a 'demographic winter' is sweeping across Russia, turning
the once 'evil empire' into a shadow of its former self.
-
- If this trend is not reversed soon, officials in the
Kremlin are predicting that this nation of 6.6 million square miles will
be inhabited by just 55 million people by 2075.
-
- These startling statistics released by the Russian Interior
Ministry make worrying reading for President Vladimir Putin, who has tried
to respond with a call to people from surrounding countries to come to
live in his homeland.
-
- But a damaging mixture of massive emigration by disillusioned
Russians to Europe and elsewhere, crippling poverty and poor levels of
nutrition are slowly killing off a once-great superpower.
-
- >From the borders of Europe to the frozen steppes
of Siberia and the Pacific coastline of Vladivostok, Russia is still geographically
a powerful presence despite having shed its Soviet-era neighbours.
-
- It contains around 40% of the world's reserves of natural
gas, 30% of its standing timber and a quarter of its coal, diamonds and
gold.
-
- Yet it has emerged that the decline in Russia's population
has been continuing for a decade, although until now the figures have been
a closely guarded secret.
-
- Until 1989, the population had been flourishing, having
grown by 30 million people in three decades. But official records show
that between 1992 and 2000, Russia's population dropped by three million.
-
- The population today stands at around 144 million, but
that is due to drop to 101 million by 2050, and to 55 million by 2075.
-
- The impact of this drop is already dramatic. Around 13,000
villages in Russia are no longer inhabited, with a further 35,000 villages
on the verge of becoming ghost towns of 10 people or fewer. The average
number of births per 100 women is now at an all-time low of just 1.2. And
now, of the country's 89 Federal Administrative Districts, or regions,
only 11 have an equal birth-death rate - among them Chechnya, despite its
continual wars and constant stream of refugees seeking asylum in the West.
-
- Migration has had a big role to play. Outer regions such
as Chukotka are losing inhabitants to central and southern Russia, while
residents in the bigger cities are fleeing abroad in search of jobs.
-
- Michail Borissov, a lab technician who works as a taxi
driver in Vienna, Austria, is a typical Russian abroad. He said: "There
is nothing in Russia for me. Even driving a car here brings me more money
than I would get back home, even if I could get a job. At least here there
are opportunities to believe in."
-
- The US also recorded a decline in birth rates in the
early 1990s, but the government reversed the trend through active immigration.
Russia does not possess the same pulling power, and while it attracts migrants
from the former Soviet countries, they are often unskilled and have little
to offer. In contrast, those leaving the country tend to be the young and
educated.
-
- Government figures suggest 1.1 million Russians left
the country between 1991 and 2002, but some demographic experts place this
figure at more than seven million.
-
- A report published this week by the international refugee
organisation UNHCR also revealed Russia has overtaken countries such as
Iraq and Afghanistan to become the leading 'exporter' of refugees.
-
- Diederik Kramers, from the organisation's EU regional
office, said: "From January to September 2002, there were 14,107 asylum
applications to the EU from Russian citizens. In the same period of time
this year, there were 23,465 requests - a 66% increase."
-
- Nina Adamova, from the International Organisation for
Migration, said: "Most of these people are economically motivated.
They are looking for a better life, better job, better housing and a better
education."
-
- Poverty is also contributing to the falling birth rate.
For example, in Murmansk, one of Russia's largest regions, every third
family is now officially below the breadline.
-
- Dr Marina Malysheva, from the Moscow Centre for Gender
Studies, said: "One in four women do not want to have children at
all, because they are not sure they can provide them with an acceptable
standard of living."
-
- Putin has said that ethnic Russians from surrounding
countries are the target group for his immigration drive.
-
- He added: "Immigrants want to settle on the Black
Sea coast, but in reality such people are most needed in Siberia and other
regions where there is a dire lack of skilled labour force."
-
- But even he admits the chance of luring people to spend
the rest of their lives in Siberia is as remote as the land itself.
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- ©2003 Scotsman.com
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- http://www.news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1319042003
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