Despite surpassing 8 billion people in November 2022, global population growth is slowing down. However, these declines have not been equal across the globe—while some countries show explosive growth, others are beginning to wane.
In an analysis of 236 countries and territories around the world, 40 were estimated to have shrinking populations, with some experiencing a decline of 1 percent a year, or more. The data was compiled as part of the United States government’s World Factbook, published by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
“This [pattern of decline] is mostly due to persistently low (and in some cases extreme low) fertility rates, especially in many countries in Europe, and East Asia (but also in Puerto Rico and Cuba),” Tomas Sobotka, a senior researcher at the Wittgenstein Center for Demography and Global Human Capital and deputy director of the Vienna Institute of Demography, told Newsweek.
“Countries with sharp population decline often combine low fertility, outmigration and relatively old population structures. Especially South-eastern and Eastern European countries have seen their populations shrinking rapidly due to a combination of intensive outmigration and persistent low fertility.”
According to the CIA data, the countries and territories with the fastest shrinking populations are as follows:
- Cook Islands—shrinking by 2.24 percent every year
- American Samoa
- Saint Pierre and Miquelon
- Puerto Rico
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- Poland
- Romania
- Estonia
- Federated States of Micronesia
The map below lists these 10 countries, illustrating countries with shrinking populations in blue, and those with growing populations in red.
The United States in growing at a moderate pace of 0.67 percent every year. However, you may have noticed one very large blue area on the map in particular: Russia.
Russia has the 16th fastest shrinking population on the CIA’s list, but why? “[Russia] has been facing challenging demographic trends—low fertility, stagnating or slightly shrinking population, huge regional disparities (with many peripheral regions shrinking), but also persistently high mortality and poor health of the population, for quite a while,” Sobotka said.
“In theory, the war could boost Russia’s population if Russie were able to capture a lot of new territory (and the population with it),” Sobotka said. “In reality, this is delusional.
“Even if Russia would be successful in its invasion, it would often capture many broken and destroyed cities with old and vulnerable people left—not the kind of population boost Putin would be dreaming about.
He continued: “More important, the war is in fact leading to more deaths, disability and injuries of many Russian men in peak productive and reproductive ages. This also leads to a faster shrinking of the labor force, more pressure on health care, and fewer kids being born—the very trends that Putin was obsessively trying to reverse.”
Going forward, Sobotka said these shrinking trends are likely to continue as many countries continue to see declining fertility rates and aging populations. “Global population growth will continue slowing down, both in absolute and relative terms,” Sobotka said. “More countries will see their populations shrinking. This includes some of the big countries as well.
“For instance, China first saw its population dropping during the COVID pandemic in 2021, largely because of falling fertility rather than due to high COVID mortality. Last year, China’s population dropped by more than 3 million, according to the UN estimates, and this process will accelerate in the next years and decades. Also, other East Asian countries, especially Japan and South Korea, will see their populations to continue falling due to very low fertility rates and aged population structure.”
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