Portugal is among the European Union countries with one of the lowest birth rates, according to Eurostat the statistical office of the EU.

Eurostat revealed that in 2017, 5.075 million babies were born in the European Union (EU), compared with 5.148 million in 2016. The total fertility rate in the EU stood at 1.59 births per woman in 2017, compared with 1.60 in 2016.

The highest total fertility rate since the start of comparable time series was in 2010 when it reached 1.62, still below the replacement level, which is considered to be 2.1 live births per woman.

Among the 5.075 million births, 45 percent concerned a first child, 36 percent a second child and 19 percent a third or subsequent child.

On average in the EU, women who gave birth to their first child in 2017 were 29.1 years old. Over five years, the mean age has gradually increased from 28.7 in 2013 to 29.1 in 2017.

Almost 5 percent of births of first children in the EU in 2017 were to women aged less than 20 (teenage mothers) and around 3 percent to women aged 40 and over.

In 2017, France (1.90 births per woman) was the Member State with the highest total fertility rate in the EU, followed by Sweden (1.78), Ireland (1.77), Denmark (1.75) and the United Kingdom (1.74). Conversely, the lowest fertility rates were observed in Malta (1.26 births per woman), Spain (1.31), Italy and Cyprus (both 1.32), Greece (1.35), Portugal (1.38), and Luxembourg (1.39).

The highest proportions of births of a first child to women aged 40 and over were registered in Spain (7.4 percent of total births of first child in 2017) and Italy (7.3 percent), followed by Greece (5.6 percent), Luxembourg (4.9 percent), Ireland (4.8 percent) and Portugal (4.3 percent).

The current population of Portugal is 10,262,020  (2019), based on the latest United Nations estimates. Portugal population is equivalent to 0.13% of the total world population; 67.7 % of the population is urban (6,945,951 people in 2019); the median age is 44.4 years.

paj.staff

Source: Eurostart