Migration, fertility decline and aging – Reasons for Armenia’s demographic decline

The UN Population Fund has conducted a study on demographic situation improvement.

Presenting the results of the study, UN Population Fund’s Executive Representative Garik Hayrapetyan said that in the case of an optimistic scenario, Armenia’s population will reach 3.2 million by 2050. This is in case of conducting a serious policy aimed at stabilizing demography. “This is just a prediction and there may also be unpredictable situations, such as four-day wars, which can change these predictions at once”.

As for the pessimistic scenario, according to Garik Hayrapetyan, if nothing is done to reduce emigration, to boost birth, then fewer than two million people will stay in Armenia.

In his words, Armenia is vulnerable to three major processes affecting demography: migration, birth rate decline and aging.

In the late 1980’s, Armenia had the best demographic situation, but after independence, the situation began to deteriorate. According to him, the economic and social situation of the years of independence has had its influence and the birth rate has dropped almost twice, the birth rate from 2.5 has dropped to 1.5.

Full text in Armenian