In Tuscany, births are less than half of deaths. This is the data that tells the story of the demographic winter of our region, which emerges from the report of the Regional Health Agency and which marks, in 2023, the eleventh consecutive year of decline in new births: just 20,839, compared to 43,957 deaths. The difference between the two numbers becomes all the more striking, because after the anomalous years of the pandemic, which had dragged the death bar upwards, the last one recently concluded was the first not to record any substantial effect related to Covid.
A region without generational turnover
In short, a pure figure, and with a range even wider than the Italian one: if in Tuscany there is one new born every 2.1 deaths, in Italy the average stops at 1.7. Even in absolute terms, the problem of empty cots in our region is particularly evident: There are 5.7 newborns per 1,000 inhabitants in Tuscany, i.e. less than the 6.4 per thousand in Italy, a figure that places our region in fourth-to-last place nationally. And if Pisa has more children, with an incidence of 6.3 per thousand, followed by Florence with 5.9, bringing up the rear is the province of Massa Carrara with 4.8. Massa is also the area with the highest number of deaths, 14.2 per thousand, while the province of Prato records a very low figure of 9.2, which, thanks to the migrations of recent decades, also has the lowest old age index. In fact, if Grosseto has 28.9 percent of people over 65, Prato stops at 22.9, significantly ahead of all the other provinces.
Moreover, explains Ars, “in terms of health, the coastal strip is confirmed, within the region, as the area with the lowest values of life expectancy at birth”, almost two years less on average.
The reasons for the demographic winter
The report, written by Fabio Voller and Francesco Profili reworking Istat data, talks about a demographic winter that has multiple factors: the aging of the population, with a reduced number of women of childbearing age (the decline in new births in the past influences the current one), job insecurity and low wages, the “structural lack” of free nursery schools, but also factors social and cultural difficulties linked to economic difficulties that “make young people insecure about planning for the future”.
Moreover, «we are also witnessing a change in values, the traditional family model is changing, with more and more couples choosing not to marry or have children. Furthermore, there is a growing focus on personal and professional fulfillment, which can lead to postponing motherhood or giving it up altogether.” The result is that in 2023, compared to 2008, there will be almost 40 percent fewer newborns, “an impressive figure”.
However, the population is not decreasing, thanks to migrants
There However, the population resident in Tuscany is not decreasing, indeed it recorded a very slight increase, with 3,664,798 people as of 31 December, 2,817 more than a year earlier. How is it possible?
The factor that compensates for the birth crisis is represented by migrations, to a small extent within Italy, mostly from abroad: the positive balance of resident Italians is around four thousand, a sign that Tuscany attracts from the whole peninsula more than it loses towards large cities, such as Milan or Rome. But it is thanks to the 22 thousand more foreigners – 31 thousand new residents, 9 thousand those who have canceled themselves from the regional registers – that the phenomenon of empty cradles is compensated for. Net of deaths among immigrants, the increase in the foreign population in Tuscany was 14,663 people in one year. Thus, as of 31 December, foreign citizenship in Tuscany reached 429,853 units, equal to 11.7 percent of the total population, compared to an Italian average of 9 percent.
