Statistics Yearbook: Slightly more births, more people returning
The fresh Statistics Estonia yearbook shows that more people returned to live in Estonia in 2014 than in previous year, although net migration is still negative.
Alis Tammur, a senior analyst at Statistics Estonia, said the trend is that lower educated people are leaving Estonia as they earn less and find it harder to survive.
Net migration was 700 last year, far lower than around 2,000 in previous years. In 2014, 4,600 people left Estonia to live abroad, mostly to Finland, Germany and Sweden. On the immigration side, Russia, Ukraine and the United States were the top three nations of origin for people relocating to Estonia.
The birth rate was still negative, although 20 more children were born in 2014 (13,551) compared to the year before, the first increase for many years. The number of deaths increased by 240 to 15,484.
Life expectancy at birth jumped for men, from 71.4 in 2013 to 72.7. The figure for women was 81.3 in 2014, 0.1 years more than in 2013. Both figures still fall short of the EU average which stands at 77.5 for men and 83.1 for women.
2014 saw a total of 3,218 divorces, 125 fewer than in the previous year, according to yearbook.
Editor: J.M. Laats