ROME — Italy’s birth rate has dropped to its lowest level ever, fueling concerns for the nation’s demographic and economic future.
According to a report Friday from Istat, Italy’s Bureau of Statistics, just 393,000 babies were born in 2022, down some 1.8 percent from the 400,249 born in 2021. This figure represents a historic low for the country already suffering from massive brain drain because of emigration.
Annual births had never before dropped below 400,000 since the unification of Italy in 1861, Istat reported, and the average age of the population has again increased, from 45.7 years to 46.4.
Italy’s death rate is now significantly higher than its birth rate, with 12 deaths per 1,000 inhabitants compared to just 7 births per 1,000 inhabitants.
Population loss through emigration was also up in 2022, Istat revealed, with net population loss due to migration reaching 229,000, up from 160, in 2021 and just 80,000 in 2020.
As observers have been noting for years, Italy’s falling birth rate, high emigration, and increasing immigration are also producing an important demographic shift in the Italian population, as native Italians form an ever-diminishing percentage of the entire population.
Among the causes for the declining birth rate, Istat cited fewer couples opting to have children as well as the decline in size and progressive aging of the female population of reproductive age (from 15 to 49 years).
The region with the highest fertility is Trentino-Alto Adige (1.51 children per woman), followed by Sicily and Campania, but even in these areas, the birth rate is well below replacement level.
Istat predicts that the Italian population, now just under 59 million, will decline to just 48 million by 2070, resulting in fewer and fewer taxpayers to fund the nation’s pensions and healthcare system.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has repeatedly sounded the alarm over the low number of births in Italy and the dire implications for the country’s future.
Meloni, Italy’s first female prime minister, ran on an election campaign motto of “God, Family, Homeland” and has promised assistance to young couples who would like to have children.
“The challenge of the birth rate is our challenge of life,” Meloni said in a 2022 Twitter post. “While in Italy the left has always preferred the shortcut of immigration to solve the problem of demographic decline, Fratelli d’Italia has always placed family assistance policies at the center of the debate.”
“Italy is a nation destined to disappear,” Meloni has warned in reference to dire demographic data. “Fratelli d’Italia has been leading for years, often alone, a battle to ensure that the birth rate is a priority for Italy and for Europe.”
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