Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov.21
By Gulgiz Muradova – Trend:
Azerbaijan will certainly retain its position of the demographic leader in the South Caucasus throughout the century, Dr. Farid Babayev, Assistant Representative of UNFPA Azerbaijan Country Office told Trend.
Babayev said that Azerbaijan is the most dynamic nation in the South Caucasus in terms of demographic development with a population twice that of Georgia and three times that of Armenia.
Babayev stressed that in the next three decades Azerbaijan’s population is projected to grow by over half a million people per decade. During the 21st century the population of Azerbaijan is likely to increase by over 3 million people and 70 percent of the growth will occur in the first half of the century.
Population growth in Azerbaijan was and continues to be ensured mainly (and almost exclusively) by the excess of the number of births over the number of deaths, he said, adding that the impact of external migration on the change in the population size in Azerbaijan is insignificant.
He added that Azerbaijan’s working age population has been growing rapidly over the past few decades. According to the UN medium variant projections , this growth will continue until 2018, with the number of females aged 20-59 and males aged 20-63 expected to reach six million (an almost 68 percent increase).
Azerbaijan will experience a large increase in the labour force during the first half of the 21st century when the population group aged 18-20 enter the labour market, he said.
The population of Azerbaijan increased by 65,292 people (0.7 percent) and reached 9,875,273 million people as of October 1, 2017, Azerbaijani State Statistics Committee said in a message.
About 107,459 children were born in Azerbaijan in the nine months of 2017, including 53.1 percent – boys, 46.9 percent – girls. Of the newborns, 1,918 are twins and 33 triplets, according to the State Statistics Committee.
Around 43,089 deaths have been registered over the first nine months of 2017. The mortality rate per 1,000 people accounted was 6.5.
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