More people are leaving Croatia, and more are dying than being born. The premilinary 2015 statistics.
Croatia's population numbers continued their downward spiral in 2015, reports HINA on February 20, 2016.
"Croatia had 4,210,700 inhabitants in 2015, 27,700 less than in 2014, the national statistical office said on Saturday, citing preliminary data.
"Also, Croatia had 38,142 births and 55,651 deaths last year, whereas in 2014 there were 11,273 more deaths than births. In 2015, there were 19,567 new marriages, 66 more than in 2014, and 5,725 divorces, 845 less than in 2014."
The situation was deemed so serious that the new ruling coalition proposed the formation of a new ministry, the Ministry of Demographic Revival, whose acronym unfortunately translates as 'a person with large testicles', which caused much ridicule, with satirists having a field day.
The ministry seems to have been shelved but the problem remains, and in addition to the lower birthrates and slow emigration of Croatia's youth in search of better economic opportunity remains an additional challenge - how to encourage some of the estimated 3 million Croatian diaspora to return to the homeland.
