Serbia: Census shows shrinking population

Belgrade, 15 Nov. (AKI) - Serbia’s population has been reduced by five per cent in the past nine years, mostly because of low birthrate and migrations, the latest census published on Tuesday showed.

Dragan Vukmirovic, director of state statistics bureau, told a press conference in Belgrade the census conducted last month showed that Serbia had a population of 7.1 million, 377,000 less than during last census in 2002.

The figures didn’t include former Serbia’s province of Kosovo, whose 1.7 million ethnic Albanians declared independence in 2008. In addition, ethnic Albanians concentrated in southern Presevo Valley, boycotted the census.

Vukmirovic said only for cities, including capital Belgrade, have shown population increases, while many villages in rural areas are dying out. In 85 per cent of municipalities the population has been reduced by nine and more per cent, he said.

Close to 300,000 Serbian citizens live abroad and the number of villages with less than 100 inhabitants has increased to 975 from 707 nine years ago, the census showed.

Other data, including ethnic and religious structure of the population, will be revealed over the next two years, Vukmirovic said. Apart from Serbs, who are Orthodox Christians, Serbia has a sizable ethnic Albanian, Muslim and ethnic Hungarian minority.

Before Kosovo secession, Serbs represented 63 per cent of the country’s population, but that number should be much higher with Kosovo excluded