The Czech Republic's population rose considerably in 2019, entirely due to migration

Prague, March 20 (CTK) – The population number rose by 44,139 to 10,693,939 in the Czech Republic last year, which was the highest rise over the past 11 years, according to the preliminary data released by the Czech Statistical Office (CSU) today.

As the number of deaths was slightly higher than that of births, the total increase was all due to foreign migration.

Last year, 112,231 children were born, 1,800 fewer than in 2018. The number of deaths, 112,362, also diminished by 600.

In 2019, Czechs concluded 54,870 marriages, 400 more than in 2018. Their number was increasing for the sixth year in a row, having reached the second highest number since 2001.

“There were only more marriages in 2007. The growing interest in marriages was recorded both among single and divorced partners,” Michaela Nemeckova, from the the CSU demographic statistics department, said.

Last year, 65,571 foreigners came to the Czech Republic, while 21,301 people left the country.

“Ukrainians’ migration accounted for over 40 percent of the foreign migration balance. Last year, 18,000 of them immigrated here,” Terezie Styglerova, the head of the CSU demographic statistics department, said.

They were followed by a wide margin by Slovaks (4,602 more), Russians and Romanians.

The proportion of the children born out of the wedlock decreased to 48.2 percent. Most children were born to the women at the age of 30 and over one-third of child-bearing women were of the age 28-32.