Population Aging – Dangerous Challenge of Georgia

Author: Giorgi Meladze
Keywords: Population, aging, epidemiological transition
Annotation:

Population Aging – Dangerous Challenge of Georgia GGiorgi Meladze giorgi.meladze@tsu.ge Department of Geography, TSU, 3 ave. I.Chavchavadze, build. II. Population aging is essentially associated with the societal progress. Any country, earlier or later will face the problem of population aging, mainly caused by low fertility and increased life expectancy. The determinants of the demographic aging such as fertility, mortality, life expectancy and migration are analyzed based on the relevant statistics. The population of Georgia reached the level of demographic aging - with the ratio of population aged 65 and over of 7% or more of the total population after the Second World War. This was mostly caused by the structural changes in the age structure of the population as a result of the War. Approximately 700.000 citizens of the country participated in the War with about 300.000 of them perished. In addition, the birth rate drastically decreased in the years of War. It is underlined that if before the 1990s the principal factor contributing to the process of aging was the fertility decline, the situation has drastically changed due to the social-economic crisis in the last decade of the past century having forced hundreds of thousands of working aged (15-64) people in Georgia to leave the country. This process changed the age structure of the country. The absolute number of newborns decreased further and proportion of the older population increased. The peculiarity of the process of the epidemiological transition in Georgia is considered and explains why the life expectancy in Georgia is much lower than in western countries. The analysis of the demographic aging of the population uses such indicators as the population aging index, potential and parent support ratios, aged dependency ratios, etc. An opinion about the further increase of demographic aging leading to severe social-economic problems in the country is expressed in the article.

Lecture files:

Population Aging – Dangerous Challenge of Georgia [en]
მოსახლეობის დაბერება-საქართველოს სახიფათო გამოწვევა [ka]