Demography
The economic crisis and the slowdown in the arrival of immigrants have put the birth rate back down to levels recorded four years ago
03.07.10 - 12:42 -
The economic crisis seems to have scared the stork away from Malaga. After ten years of steady growth, births in the province fell in 2009 by around six per cent, according to the National Institute of Statistics (INE). In fact last year there were 1,138 fewer babies born in hospitals around the province than in 2008; the total falling from 19,015 to 17,877, a figure similar to that of 2006.
Sources from the Sociology Department at Malaga University blame the current financial climate for the downward trend. Increasing unemployment, firms and self-employed professionals in difficulty and varying interest rates seem to have put numerous couples off the idea of extending their families last year.
“Demography reflects what is happening in a country; it’s not so much the situation people are in at the moment but the sensation of not knowing how they will be in the future”, point out sociologists, who stress that the first thing couples aim for before planning a baby is job stability, something that has been hard to come by in recent months.
Of the municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants in the province of Malaga, Benalmádena, Torremolinos and Estepona have seen the greatest slump in the birth rate, with drops of 20 per cent, 10 per cent and nine per cent respectively, according to the INE. In the case of Marbella the birth rate fell last year by six per cent, from 1,929 babies born in 2008 to 1,810 in 2009.
The falling number of births has also been influenced by the general slowdown in the arrival of immigrants to the area. In January 2009 official figures indicated an increase in the province’s population of 54,915 people, of whom 21 per cent were foreign. A year later the registered increase was just 5,488, an alteration of barely 1.7 per cent.
Similarly statistics referring to births in Malaga hospitals to mothers of non-Spanish origin fell in 2009 by four per cent.
Marriages also down
The same economic and demographic factors have also put couples off getting married. According to the INE the number of weddings in 2009 was down 13 per cent on the previous year.
The statistics show therefore that the recession and unemployment are managing to alter the life plans of young people, who are putting off milestones such as marriage and children in the hope that more prosperous times are around the corner.
