Mortality rate in Spain will exceed birth rate by 2017

Although people are now living longer – the average life expectancy being 82.4 years – the population is ageing fast and by 2050, nearly four in 10 residents in Spain will be aged 65 or over.

Once the birth rate has fallen below the mortality rate, estimated to occur by around 2017, within another six years the population of Spain will have declined by 5.6 per cent, or 2.6 million people, bringing the total headcount down to 44.1 million from its current figure of nearly 47 million.

Already this year, for the first time ever, Spain has a negative immigration balance – an estimated 292,000 foreigners will have settled in the country by the end of 2013, but nearly 596,000 will have left – or for every new expatriate who arrives, two will return home.

The National Institute of Statistics (INE), which conducted the research, says Spain's population will fall by just under 242,500 by the end of this year, or 0.5 per cent, in keeping with the trend seen in 2012 when the country's headcount fell below 47 million – to 46.7 million.

Within 10 years, life expectancy will rise to an average of 87 years for women and 81.8 for men, compared to 85.1 for women and 79.3 for men as it is now.

And continuing with the trend which started in 2009 but which was already gathering impetus five years earlier, the number of children born will plummet by 17.1 per cent in the next decade – or 24.9 per cent lower than last year's figures – with just 3.9 million babies born between now and the beginning of 2023.

This is in spite of the fact that female fertility is better now than in past years, bringing the average number of children per mother to 1.41 by 2022 rather than the current 1.34.

Although the financial crisis, unemployment, the impossibility of many women in their 20s and 30s being able to leave home and settle down independently, and the constant threat of redundancy is the main culprit for the falling birth rate at the moment, within 10 years the decline will be due to a lower number of women of fertile age rather than a question of economics.

By 2023, a woman of typical child-bearing age – from 24 to 43 years old – will be one of the generation of the 1980s and 1990s, when Spain underwent a 'birth crisis' – a devastating recession similar to that seen today led to a very low natality rate.

Between now and the end of 2022, 4.1 million people will die, compared to 3.9 million births, says the INE.