Executive summary

Information on demographic trends is crucial for policy-makers. Changes in the size, growth and composition of the population, like population ageing, have an impact on practically all domains of social life. It follows that demographic indicators should be taken into account in developing and implementing policies with respect to housing, health and social care, education, the labour market, economic and physical planning and the environment. Also family policies as well as social protection and social inclusion policies are closely related to core demographic processes. The European Population Committee (CAHP) of the Council of Europe, provides the most comprehensive, Europe-wide set of demographic indicators in its annual report on Recent Demographic Developments in Europe.

Declining population growth…
The 2004 edition of the report draws attention to the slow and declining rates of population growth in Europe. The overall rate of European population growth is 0.23% resulting in a growth of 1.9 million new Europeans in the year 2003. The fastest growing countries in 2003 are Ireland, Albania, Spain and Turkey. The lowest (indeed negative) rates of population growth are observed in Ukraine, Georgia, Bulgaria and the Russian Federation.
Looking at the components of demographic change, it is increasingly evident that in a rapidly growing number of European countries natural population growth, which is the balance of births and deaths, has come to a standstill or will shortly do so. As a consequence, for Europe as a whole, more people died in 2003 than were born. Turkey is the country with the highest rate of natural growth, followed by Albania, Ireland and Azerbaijan.
Migration is the other, and increasingly dominant, population growth factor. The highest rates of positive net migration (the balance of immigration and emigration) are witnessed in Southern Europe, with Spain and Italy as the most populous examples.
The total population growth of 1.9 million persons in the year 2003 is the balance of some 2 million migrants and a negative natural population growth of some 63 000. Natural population growth was positive for the 25 countries of the European Union by some 183 000 and negative by 247 000 for the other member states.
Slow and declining population growth signals the onset of population decline as an overall outlook for Europe’s population. As indicated in the report, this process already is in full swing at the national level in Central and Eastern Europe. At the regional level population decline is increasingly evident throughout Europe. How to cope with declining populations will be a major policy issue for the coming decades. Taking into account that the components of natural population growth (fertility and mortality) do not show any indications of major changes, it goes without saying that international migration is the uncertain factor in this regard. International migration trends are highly volatile and difficult to predict or forecast. Economic and political determinants are at play in international migration, as are a multitude of other factors, including for instance admission policies. Reliable and comparable data on international migration are scarce, which seriously hampers the policy process.

…and increased population ageing
Another outcome of slow and declining population growth, is population ageing, which currently is the most outstanding feature of Europe’s demography. Viewed from a global perspective, today Europe is the oldest world region. The current age structure of the European population reflects its demographic past and is the inevitable outcome of structural changes in fertility and mortality, which are the root causes of population ageing. And as was already indicated, there are no indications of major changes in either European fertility or mortality. It follows that population ageing is “here to stay”.
The challenges for European society to successfully address population ageing can only increase since the main thrust of population ageing is yet to come. Policies to accommodate population ageing need to be multifold, addressing for instance the labour market, social and health care, housing, education and social protection.

…due to low and late fertility
Looking at one of the root causes of population ageing, namely fertility, currently European women have 1.5 children on average, a decline from 1.8 in 1990. This is well below the so-called replacement level of 2.1 children. The mean age of women who become mother for the first time is currently 25.9 years, an increase from 24.4 years in 1990. Extramarital births are increasingly common. Currently some 28% of children are born out of wedlock in Europe, a large share of whom, however, are born to cohabiting partners.

… and favourable mortality
Mortality levels show wide variation across Europe, with generally less favourable conditions in Central and Eastern Europe. The overall indicators show an increasing average life expectancy for women from 77.0 years in 1990 to a current 78.8 years. For men, the comparable figures are 70 and 72.1, indicating that male life expectancy is growing faster than female life expectancy. Generally speaking the gap between female and male life expectancy is narrowing in Europe.
Europe is experiencing another exciting phase in its demographic transition. The national variation in overall trends is considerable and needs close monitoring. The challenges for society in general and policy-makers in particular, embedded in the overall trends and patterns of population change, are truly wide-ranging and also call for a close watch.
Through its annual publication on Recent Demographic Developments in Europe, the European Population Committee (CAHP) provides this unique, Europe-wide monitoring to the benefit of policy-makers and population analysts worldwide. CAHP’s in-depth studies on policy-relevant population issues add substance to the indicators and trends reported here.

Introduction : The State of Europe’s Population, 2003

Changes in the size, growth and composition of the population are of key importance to policy-makers in practically all domains of life. To provide reliable demographic indicators, as well as insights into the determinants and consequences of current and future demographic trends, has been an ongoing concern of the Council of Europe for many years. The Council’s European Population Committee (CAHP) provides these indicators for all member states, and occasionally also non-member states, in its annual publication “Recent Demographic Developments in Europe”. The Committee also executes policy-oriented population research projects on a wide array of topics relevant to the work programme of the Council.
As before, the 2004 edition of the report on Recent Demographic Developments, contains the most comprehensive and up to date Europe-wide demographic information. After this Introduction, which summarises the major outcomes, the report contains an overview of the main indicators in comparative tables, and a methodological note. The CD-Rom presents national reports and demographic indicators by country including detailed time-series data for the main indicators.

Population growth and population density
According to United Nations estimates, the current size of the world population is 6.3 billion. After a period of historically unprecedented population growth during the 20th century, when the world population grew from 1.6 to 6.1 billion, population growth rates have come down to a current overall level of 1.2% with further declines projected. The bulk of world population increase is concentrated in the developing countries. United Nations population projections, in their so-called medium variant, indicate a world population of 8.9 billion by the year 2050 (UN, 2003).
The share of Europe in the world population has declined from some 25% at the beginning of the 20th century to a current 12%, and a further decrease is foreseen. At the beginning of 2004, the total population of Europe is estimated at 815 million. The majority of Europe’s population is living in the European Union (56%). The other member states of the Council of Europe account for 43% and the remaining 1% comes to the only non-member European country, Belarus (cf Map 1).

During 2003, the total population of Europe grew by 1.9 million people, corresponding to an annual growth rate of 0.23%. As is shown in Figure 1, this increase is due entirely to the previous EU-15 countries. Both in the ten new EU member states and in the other Council of Europe member states the population slightly declined because of a negative natural increase (more deaths than live births) which is not compensated for by a small surplus of international migration.

Figure 1 Population growth in Europe in 2003

European countries vary greatly according to geographical size and population. The smallest in population is San Marino, with 29 thousand inhabitants, followed by six other countries with less than one million inhabitants (Liechtenstein, Andorra, Iceland, Malta, Luxembourg, and Cyprus).The most populated countries in Europe are the Russian Federation with 144 million, Germany (83 million), Turkey (71 million), France (60 million), the United Kingdom (60 million), and Italy (58 million). Together these six countries account for 58% of Europe’s total population.
Population density, which is a function of a country's land area as well as its population, also fluctuates greatly from one state to another. The most inhabitants per square kilometre live in Malta (1 265), followed by the Netherlands (481), San Marino (471) and Belgium (339). Of the countries with over 50 million inhabitants, the United Kingdom (246) and Germany (231) have relatively high densities. At the other extreme, in northern Europe, Iceland (just 3 inhabitants per km²), the Russian Federation (8), Norway (14) and Finland (15) are characterised by very low densities. Variation within countries may however be significant.
Of the 39 European countries with more than one million inhabitants, 4 (Ireland, Albania, Spain and Turkey) had the highest rates of population growth in 2003, i.e. around 16 per 1000 of the population at the beginning of that year (see Figure 2). However, the composition of these growth rates varies: for Ireland the contribution of natural increase more or less equals the contribution of net migration, for Albania and Turkey natural increase is the main growth component while for Spain net migration accounts for the high growth rate. The second country in transition (after Albania) in the top ten of fastest growing populations is Azerbaijan, due to natural increase. Obviously, these two countries are exceptions to the rule that countries in transition can generally be characterised by negative growth rates. Indeed, all the bottom ten countries belong to this group, starting with Ukraine with a population decrease of 8 per 1000, followed by Georgia (-6), Bulgaria (-6), the Russian Federation (-5), Latvia (-5), and Lithuania (-5).

Figure 2 Ten highest and ten lowest rates of population growth in Europe in 2003

* Rough estimates.
NB Countries with fewer than one million inhabitants have been ignored.

Generally speaking natural population growth is declining in Europe; increasingly, natural growth is negative or only marginally positive (cf Map 2). As a result, for Europe as a whole, more people died in 2003 than were born, although this difference is still very small. While in 1990 only three countries (Germany, Bulgaria and Hungary) had a negative natural growth, in 2003 this is true for almost all countries in transition and also for Italy and Greece. The country with currently the highest rate of natural growth is Turkey (14), although also in this country this rate is falling slowly but steadily.
Most of the countries in transition have been characterised by a modest negative rate of net migration since 1990 (cf Map 3). In 2003, exceptions are the Czech Republic (+2.5), Croatia (2.5), Slovenia (1.8), Hungary (1.6), the Russian Federation (0.7), Belarus (0.5), and the Slovak Republic (0.3). However, except for Slovenia, net immigration in these countries is not sufficient to compensate for negative natural growth.
In 2003 the highest rates of positive net migration can be found in the southern part of Europe: Andorra (70), Cyprus (16), Spain (14), San Marino (14), and Italy (11). Of the older countries of immigration, the Netherlands (0.4) and France (1.0) had the lowest, and Switzerland (4.7) and Belgium (3.4) the highest rates of positive net migration in 2003, the others being Sweden (3.2), Austria (3.1), Norway (2.5), Germany (1.9), the United Kingdom (1.7), and Denmark (1.3). Since the 1990s, the group of immigration countries was joined by Spain, Italy, Portugal, Greece, and Ireland, all formerly countries of emigration.
Low and declining population growth irreversibly results in changing age structures, with population ageing as its main outcome.

Population ageing
One of the most outstanding features of Europe’s demography is population ageing, i.e the decreasing share of the younger age groups in the overall population and the increasing share of the older age groups. Viewed from a global perspective, Europe is by far the oldest world region. The median age, i.e the age that divides the population into two equal halves, may be used as an indicator of population ageing. Currently the median age is 37.7 in Europe, compared to a world level of 26.4; in the other major world regions the median age is 35.4 in Northern America, 30.7 in Oceania, 26.1 in Asia, 24.2 in Latin America and the Caribbean and 18.3 in Africa (UN, 2003).
The current age structure of a population reflects its demographic past and is the inevitable outcome of structural changes in fertility and mortality. As there are no indications of major changes in both these root causes of population ageing in Europe, it follows that population ageing is “here to stay”. It is self-evident that population ageing poses major challenges to society. As the main thrust of population ageing is yet to come, these challenges can only intensify. Accommodating policies to cope with the multiple impacts of population ageing are urgently needed and should be multifold, inter alia addressing the labour market, social and health care, housing, education, social protection, including pension schemes and social cohesion.
The root causes of population ageing are twofold. On the one hand population ageing is fuelled by low fertility, primarily resulting in lower shares of the young. Current fertility levels are below the so-called replacement level of 2.1 children per woman on average in the overwhelming majority of European countries (see below). Low mortality levels and thus increasing life expectancy (below) also trigger population ageing and yield growing shares of the older population. It should be noted that population ageing not only impacts on the extremes of the age structure: it also affects, for instance, the potentially active population in cases where the labour force is ageing as well.
In Figure 3 (Age pyramid on January 1st 2003), the current age structure of Europe’s population is presented. It is obvious that the largest age groups are those around age 40 (i.e born in the early 1960s). Especially the birth cohorts after 1985 are substantially smaller, as are the birth cohorts from the early 1940s, the latter due to the impacts of the Second World War.
In Figure 4 the current highest and lowest ranking countries as regards the shares of the youngest age groups (0-14 years) in the total populations are presented. According to this indicator, by far the youngest countries are Albania (32% of its population was 0-14 years of age in 2000), Turkey (29% in 2004) and Azerbaijan (26% in 2004). The lowest shares of younger people are all between 14,2% (Bulgaria) and 15.2% (Ukraine).
Figure 5 presents similar data for the older age groups (65 years or over) in the total populations. Five of oldest countries, with shares of over 16%, also had low shares of young : Italy, Greece, Germany, Bulgaria and Spain.

A summary indicator of ageing is provided by the so-called dependency ratio. Usually two dependency ratios are distinguished: the share of the young population (below age 15) relative to the potentially active population (of 15-64) indicates what may be labelled as the “green pressure”. Higher green pressures are associated with for instance higher costs for education. The “grey pressure” gives the share of the older (65-plus) population relative to the potentially active population. A high grey pressure is commonly associated with for instance high cost for (health) care and pensions. Taken together, the green and the grey pressure give the overall dependency ratio, as an indicator of “population” pressure. It will come as no surprise that young and growing populations have a larger green pressure than older and declining populations, where the grey pressure is most dominant. It should however be noted that for several reasons, these are rough indicators. On the one hand, education usually does not stop at age 15 (increasingly education needs are present throughout the life course: life-long learning); also young people may be active on the labour market before age 15. At the other extreme, some elderly may remain economically active after age 65. Finally it should be noted that the “potentially” active population includes those that are not economically active for reasons of unemployment, disability, and the like.Taking this into account, Figure 6 presents the ranking of countries with respect to the dependency ratio.The highest overall dependency ratios are registered for Albania, Turkey and Iceland, which also have high shares of young persons and low shares of older persons. The high dependency ratios in Sweden, France and Belgium, on the contrary, are caused by the fact that these countries have high shares of older persons. The low dependency ratios in Ukraine, Slovenia, the Czech Republic and Andorra are mainly caused by the low shares of young persons, while in Moldova, the Slovak Republic and Liechtenstein they are basically caused by low shares of the older population.

Family formation and dissolution
In recent years major changes in family formation and dissolution trends took place, generally with declining numbers of marriages and increasing numbers of divorces and consensual unions; moreover the age at first marriage increased as well.
In 2002, the most recent year for which almost all European countries have data available, the total first marriage rate for women below the age of 50 years was 0.62 on average in Europe, which is well below the level of 0.77 in 1990. The variation among countries is significant as is shown in Figure 7 and Map 4. Note that two countries (Cyprus and Malta) have a first marriage probability above 1.00, which is due to a strong concentration of the number of marriages contracted in a specific year. Irrespective of these two, all other countries have rates ranging between a low of 0.42 (Estonia) and a high of 0.85 (“The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”).
The mean age of women at first marriage shows an even larger variation (Figure 8 and Map 5). On average a European woman married for the first time at the age of 26,5 years in 2002. Around 1990 the average age still was about 24,2 years. In 2002 all Scandinavian countries have a pattern of late first marriage which is also the case nowadays for the Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland. Early first marriage is almost completely located in Eastern Europe, i.e. in several of the new EU member states and in other non-EU members of the Council of Europe.
Marriage dissolution by divorce also shows strong variation (Figure 9 and Map 6). On average the European probability of having a divorce is 0.32 in 2002 as compared to 0.26 around 1990. Very low divorce rates still prevail in countries like Italy, Poland, Spain and Turkey. The highest divorce rates are observed in Scandinavia, where marriage rates are relatively low, and the age at marriage high. This Northern European pattern of family formation can also be observed in Belgium and Luxembourg as well as in Austria and the Czech Republic.

Fertility
Also European fertility patterns changed considerably in recent decades. The major changes may be summarised by a drop in the fertility level (the number of children per woman) as well as the rise in the age at first birth. In addition to low and late fertility, extra-marital fertility became more common.
A ranking of the total (period) fertility rates in 2002 is given in Figure 10. For Europe as a whole this rate was 1.8 in 1990 and 1.5 in 2002. The list of currently highest ranking countries includes both countries with decreasing rates, like for example Turkey, Ireland and Iceland, and countries which used to have lower rates more recently, like Denmark, Finland, France, the Netherlands and Norway. Until recently Ireland and Iceland were exceptions with respect to the below replacement fertility that was prevalent in Northern and Western Europe already for several decades (see also Map 7). To compensate for period effects, Figure 11 gives the total fertility rate of women born in the year 1965. These women are approaching their 40th birthday and only few among them will still have additional children. As the data in figure 10 may be distorted by accidental period influences that may have taken place in specific countries – the information in Figure 11 gives a more accurate overview of country-specific variation in childbearing. First of all it is evident that the fertility level of birth cohort 1965 is substantially higher than the 2002 period level. Obviously the women born in 1965 still used to have a large family, while currently new mothers have smaller families. The data also shows evidence from some EU countries that currently show the lowest fertility, like Austria, Germany, Greece, Italy and Spain, that also the cohort fertility rate is rather low, adding to the doubts about significant fertility recovery.
The mean age of women who become mothers for the first time is shown in Figure 12 and Map 8. The graph is based on data that display the age of the mother at her first biological birth (this excludes Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, where the birth order is calculated in marriages). In countries that report the age at the biological first birth, the mean age at first motherhood increased from 24,4 in 1990 to 25,9 in 2002. For several years the Netherlands had the ‘oldest mothers’ but currently San Marino and Spain, and possibly also Italy that has no recent information, have taken over. Very late fertility is typically concentrated in the countries of the European Union and in several of these countries the upward trends are slowing down. Early fertility is mainly concentrated in Eastern Europe; here the upward trend has recently started. Also this increasing age at childbearing adds to the low fertility levels.
Extra-marital births are becoming increasingly common (cf Map 9). In 1990 about 15% of all births in Europe occurred to non-married women, and by 2002 the percentage had risen to 28. Figure 13 gives the ranking. Not surprisingly, Scandinavian countries are found in the top panel, some with rates above 50%; but also Bulgaria, France and Georgia have significant shares of extramarital fertility. Low rates are observed in several Mediterranean countries.

Mortality
Figures 14A and B summarise life expectancy at birth. For European men, life expectancy increased from 70.0 years in 1990 to 72.1 in 2002. For women the increase was from 77.0 years to 78.8 (cf Maps 10 and 11). Male life expectancy increased stronger than for women. It should be noted that in Georgia, Moldova, Russian Federation, Ukraine and Belarus both male and female life expectancies declined in this period; Romania and Turkey also have low life expectancies for both sexes. While in Georgia and Turkey the sex difference is 6.8 and 4.6 years respectively, the difference is 11.5 and 13.2 years respectively in Ukraine and the Russian Federation, which is substantially larger than the about 7 years difference that occurs on average for Europe as a whole.
The highest life expectancies for men are observed in some Scandinavian countries, but some Mediterranean countries, like Greece, Italy and Spain, have high life expectancies as well. The ranking for female life expectancy shows similarities with the male ranking, although there is some variation in the sequence.
Another important mortality indicator is the infant mortality rate. In the period 1990-2002 the Europe-wide rate dropped from 12.7 deaths among children under 1 year of age (per 1000 live born children) to 7.9. Currently Turkey is the obvious exception with respect to the level of infant mortality as is shown in Figure 15. Other countries with high infant mortality rates are mainly located in Eastern Europe. The lowest rates are mainly observed in Western or Northern Europe (cf Map 12).