Romania’s population has decreased continuously. Among the multiple causes of this decrease are low birth rate, high death, and emigration. The paper provides details about the current population situation, the demographic evolution in Romania in development regions and macroregions and the factors with a strong impact on the country’s economic development. Romania’s population decreased from 22.41 million in 2001 to 21.53 million in 2007; population density has also decreased from 94.0 inhab/km 2 in 2001 to 90.3 inhab/km 2 in 2007. The number of urban inhabitants has also diminished from 12.24 million to 11.87 million in 2007; rural population diminished from 10.16 million to 9.65 million. In 2007, 214,728 births were registered, (the number of new-borns was with 100,018 smaller than in 1990); the number of deaths was 251,965 (4,879 deaths more than in 1990). The birth rate was 10.0 per 1,000 inhabitants, against 13.6‰ in 1990, while the death rate increased to 11.7‰ from 10.6‰ in 1990. The economic conditions in general and the precarious medical services in particular, especially in rural areas, may have lead to the low birth rate. The main factors causing the low birth rate are of economic and social nature. The employment structure of the population has changed significantly. As a result, territorial and professional mobility and longer training periods have characterized the young population. The income problem, the situation on the labour market, the difficulty in finding a place to live are obstacles that many young families find hard to overcome. The population decrease is caused chiefly by the negative natural growth (-1.7/1,000 inhab in 2007, against +3.00 in 1990). The negative natural growth is the result of the high death rate, low birth rate and domestic and international migration to other areas of the country or abroad. The estimations of the main demographic phenomena provide useful information about the future evolution of the number of inhabitants and age structure. The demographic effects will be seen in time and will bring about changes in subpopulations (school children, fertile population, employable population); they will be felt after 2005, when the employable population includes the numerically reduced generations born after 1990. Within the framework of sustainable development, the medium and long-term objectives of the national strategies and programmes and the regional and district projects must be set in accordance with the demographic prognosis.

structure of population; natural population movement; development regions

Presentation: oral