Croatia’s Natural Population Growth Negative for 17th Straight Year

For the 17th year straight Croatia has had negative natural population growth, a trend which started back in 1997….

According to data from the Central Bureau of Statistics, the number of births in 2013 (39,939) was 10,447 less than the number of people who died, which was 50,386. Last year was the first year since 2003 that there were less than 40,000 births. The number of births last year was 1,832, or 4.4%, less than the previous year of 2012 when there were 41,771 births recorded. There were 1,324 less deaths in 2013, or 2.6%, compared with 2012 when 51,710 deaths were recorded.

The trend does not look like turning anytime soon if marriages are any gauge. In 2013 there were 19,169 marriages, 1,154 fewer than in 2012, whilst 5,992 couples got divorced, 333 more than in 2012.