Romania’s population keeps shrinking although the number of births went slightly up in June compared to May.

A total of 15,230 babies were born in June 2016, 738 more than in the previous month, according to data from the National Statistics Institute (INS). Meanwhile, the number of deaths went down to 20,812.

Thus, Romania had a natural decline (the number of newborns minus number of deaths) of 5,582 people in June.

The infant mortality went slightly up month-on-month, INS data shows. A total of 127 children aged under 1 died in June, up from 124 in May.

When compared to June 2015, the number of newborns decreased by 1,003 in June this year while the number of deaths went up by 1,409. Romania had a negative natural increase in both June 2016 (5,582) and June 2015 (3,170).

The number of children aged under 1 who died in June 2016 was nine times higher than the one registered in June 2015.

In the first six months of this year, Romania registered slightly over 87,000 newborns and 130,000 deaths resulting in a population decrease of 43,000. In the same period of 2015, the number of babies born in Romania was close to 94,000 and the number of deaths was over 137,000.

Over 203,000 babies were born in Romania in 2015, some 10% more compared to 2014. However, the number of deaths also increased in 2015, reaching over 262,000 (up by 3.3%).

Romania was among the European countries with the steepest population decline last year, according to EU’s statistical office Eurostat. Some 510.1 million people were living in the European Union at the beginning of the year, up from 508.3 million on January 1, 2015. Romania was the seventh country in the EU by the size of its population, with 19.76 million people on January 1, 2016, down from 19.87 million in the same month in 2015. The county lost 5.6 people for each 1,000 citizens it had at the beginning of 2015.

Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com