The population of Western Europe keeps growing largely thanks to immigration, while Eastern Europe has been hit with serious population drain, a recently published analysis by the Austrian Academy of Sciences and the Vienna Institute of Demography showed.

Austrian scientists analysed population development across Europe in the period from 1990 to 2017, taking into account demographic trends and migrations.

The largest population growth in that period was recorded in Ireland, where it grew by 36 percent, mostly thanks to natural demographic growth. On the other end of the scale is Bosnia and Herzegovina, where the size of the population dropped by 22 percent, caused by emigration.

Croatia also recorded a negative score, with a 13 percent reduction in population since 1990, Jutarnji List daily reported on Wednesday.

Other European countries whose populations grew significantly are Switzerland (by 26 percent, mainly due to immigration), Norway (24 percent, equally thanks to birth rates and immigration), Spain (20 percent, due to immigration), France (18 percent, in larger part thanks to high birth rates and to a lesser extent due to immigration), and Sweden (17 percent, largely thanks to immigration).

On the other hand, out of all the countries that had once been part of the communist Eastern Bloc, national populations grew only in Slovenia and Slovakia – and even there, they recorded a meagre 3 percent growth since 1990. The worst affected are Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldavia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosovo, where the population has dropped by more than 20 percent in the same period.

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