Golikova announced a “demographic winter” in Russia

The “demographic winter” has already begun in 28 regions of Russia. This was announced to members of the Federation Council by Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova within the framework of the “government hour”. Women of reproductive age, according to her, refuse to have a child if they do not have a family, housing and normal income. However, Senator Lyudmila Narusova drew attention to the fact that the study does not take into account the “CBO factor”.

The low birth rate seriously worries the Russian authorities. To the surprise of officials, kindergartens, maternity capital and other measures of financial and moral support for families with children did not give the expected effect and did not lead to a baby boom.

Moreover, the demographic situation is steadily deteriorating. If in 2019 the total fertility rate (that is, the number of newborns per 1,000 population) was 10.1, then in 2022 it dropped to 8.9, and in 4 months of 2023 to 8.5. According to this indicator, Russia is below 190th place in the world, and this clearly does not correspond not only to national development goals, but also to the ambitious goals of achieving total sovereignty in everything and everywhere.

To find out what exactly prevents Russian women from giving birth, the government, according to Tatyana Golikova, conducted a large-scale study, according to the results of which Russian regions were divided into 8 clusters.

The situation with the birth of children is best in the Caucasus cluster, which includes the republics of the North Caucasus, as well as in the Siberian regions of growth (Altai, Tyva, Khakassia, Buryatia and Yakutia). More or less prosperous “Regions of resource stability” (Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Tyumen Oblast, Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug, Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug), “Capital Agglomerations” (Moscow, St. Petersburg and Moscow Region), “Ural and Transural Russia” follow.

However, in half of the regions of the country the situation is worse than average, and 28 subjects (mainly from Central, North-West Russia and the Volga region) were included by experts in the Demographic Winter cluster, where a woman with a stroller, most likely, will soon face the fate of dinosaurs.

Golikova explained that the main reasons preventing the birth of children for young women (20-29 years old) are the lack of a family, housing and normal income.

A significant number of Russian women (16% aged 20-24 years and 24% in the category 25-29 years old) do not plan pregnancy, because. want to “live for themselves.” And starting from the age of 30, women begin to fear that childbirth will lead to poor health. Among 30-34 year olds this reason was indicated as significant by 18% of respondents, and among 35-39 year olds – 13%.

In general, the authors of the study found that 4.5 million Russian women of reproductive age do not have children at all, and 4.3 million have only one child. “That is, the maximum is almost 9 million potential births for the next three years,” Golikova encouraged the senators.

However, the data presented by the Deputy Prime Minister does not explain in any way how 9 million virtual births should turn into real ones. Obviously, material well-being is not a decisive factor: most people give birth just in the leading regions in terms of poverty and unemployment (for example, Khakassia, Ossetia, Tyva, Ingushetia, Karachay-Cherkessia, etc.)

“It is important what kind of gene pool we will have,” Senator Svetlana Goryacheva was worried. – In poor families often (thrive) drug addiction, drunkenness. Benefits make it possible to give birth, and then (children) are given to the state.” However, Golikova considered such a statement of the question to be untimely. “All children born in any families are dear to us,” she stressed.

Senator Lyudmila Narusova, in turn, drew attention to the fact that the “expensive” study of the government does not take into account such an obvious factor as the SVO. For the birth of a child, as a rule, you need a man. And over the past 1.5 years, a large number of men of childbearing age have been mobilized and “far from all are returning.” According to Narusova, this also affects the decline in the birth rate.

Golikova explained that, although the “SVO factor” does not appear separately, the influence of the special operation was taken into account in the age and sex composition of the population.

The Deputy Prime Minister recalled that, since the initial situations in the regions are different, they were instructed to develop their own programs to increase the birth rate. 82 subjects have already coped with the task. The rest have a deadline of 10 July.

At the federal level, it is planned to conduct a “comprehensive pilot project to develop measures that can give the maximum effect” for demography. To do this, in the most problematic clusters “Demographic Winter”, “South of Russia” and “Volga Region”, one region was selected, where a “favorable environment for living” will be created (unfortunately, Golikova did not explain what exactly Golikova meant by this), but, hence for the birth of children.