Russian population down almost 0.5 mln to 146.24 mln over 2020, lowest level since 2014
MOSCOW. Jan 28 (Interfax) - The population of Russia was 146,238,185 on January 1, 2021, the Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat) said in a report concerning its preliminary estimate of the Russian population as of the beginning of the year.
Russia had a population of 146,748,643 on January 1, 2020, of 146,780,700 on January 1, 2019, of 146,880,400 on January 1, 2018, and of 146,804,400 on January 1, 2017.
The statistical data indicates that the Russian population has decreased by 510,500 over the past year. The last major decline in the Russian population was seen in 2005, when the population decreased from 143.8 million to 143.2 million at the beginning of 2006.
The population decreased by approximately 100,000 in 2019 and in 2018 each.
Before 2018, the last time the Russian population decreased was in 2008, after which the population grew for nine years and reached a maximum of 146.9 million at the beginning of 2019.
The total population recorded on January 1, 2021 was the least it has been since the beginning of 2014, when it stood at 143.7 million. Following Crimea's reunification with Russia, the Russian population grew to 146.3 million at the beginning of 2015 (before that, the last time the country had a population of 146.3 million was in 2001, and a minimum of 142.7 million was observed at the beginning of 2009).
The coronavirus pandemic became yet another factor affecting Russia's demographics in 2020, which both increased the death rate and decreased the influx of immigrants.
Russia's coronavirus operative response headquarters said on January 28, 2021 that the cumulative number of coronavirus infection cases registered in Russia over the period of the pandemic has reached 3,793,810, and 71,651 people have died. Rosstat's data of Covid-19 fatalities published later is usually much larger. For instance, Rosstat reported earlier that 35,645 people previously diagnosed with coronavirus died in November 2020 alone.
The net migration rate (the difference between the number of immigrants and emigrants over a certain period) declined to 86,100 people in January-October 2020 from 202,400 in January-October 2019, according to Rosstat's data.
The natural population decrease in Russia amounted to some 468,000 people in January-October 2020, with 1,193,400 births and 1,661,400 deaths recorded in this period, growing from the natural population decrease of 259,600 in January-October 2019 (1,460,600 births and 1,510,200 deaths).
Rosstat's preliminary data show that Russia's urban population amounted to 109,295,500 and its rural population was 36,941,700 as of January 1, 2021.
As of January 1, 2021, Moscow's residential population amounted to 12.636 million people, that of the Moscow region amounted to 7.713 million, St. Petersburg had 5.388 million, and the Leningrad region had 1.894 million people.
Rosstat prepares a demographic forecast annually for the country using three scenarios - low, medium, and high - based on various assumptions regarding future trends in birth and death rates and migration. Rosstat did not prepare a 2020 forecast in view of the upcoming census and is supposed to make its forecast based on the census's findings. The principal phase of the census should begin in April 2021.
The medium scenario, which is usually considered to be the most realistic and which was made at the end of 2019, projected that Russia's population would shrink to 143 million by the start of 2036. That scenario, however, projected that Russia's population would drop to under 146.3 million people only in 2023 and was to be 146.65 million in early 2021. In other words, Russia's population is now shrinking faster than Rosstat's medium scenario, including due to the coronavirus pandemic, which it certainly did not predict in 2019.