The presentation of research on demographic patterns in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) and their consequences on the social environment and development potential at the state, entity and local levels was held on Wednesday in Mostar, organized by the Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD).
The research, which was conducted by an expert on political demography, Miodrag Pantovic, shows that most of BiH can be considered a depopulating area, and significant areas as rapidly depopulating based on the vital and age indices, as well as the assessment of migration, enrolled first-year students and the perspective of young people.
”What has been established is that BiH and all the countries of this region are in the process of high depopulation where we have a low birth rate followed by high emigration, which represents a big problem for the general processes of development, planning and everything that needs to be done in a country in terms of population retention, further development and human capital. There are different estimates from relevant institutions where BiH could lose between 50 and 70 percent of its population by 2060 with current trends related to emigration and low birth rate,” Pantovic pointed out.
As for BiH, he says, emigration is the factor that contributes the most to the decrease in the number of students.
”You can see this especially in the area of the Una-Sana Canton(USC), where if you look at the number of students who are born in one year and who should enroll in the first grade for that year, you can see that the minus is somewhere up to one fifth, that is, over 20 percent of those children who born in that one year does not enroll in the first grade when they should, it is assumed that those children, that is, entire families, leave the country,” said Pantovic.
He pointed out that population policy and demography is not only a question of birth rate, but often a question of health itself.
”The countries here in the region have a much shorter life expectancy than the countries of Western Europe. Much more would be contributed to that population policy if it were invested in health prevention, educating people to live better in some way, thereby reducing mortality and in some way mitigating the effects in question. In my opinion, this is a factor that is rarely talked about,” said Pantovic.
The event is organized as part of a program supported by the United Kingdom (UK) Government.
