Portugal increased its resident population by 46,249 last year, to 10,467,366, revealed the National Statistics Institute (INE), attributing the increase to immigration, which offset the negative natural balance.
According to INE estimates, 2022 was the fourth consecutive year of population growth in Portugal.
“The population increase in 2022 resulted from net migration of 86,889 people (72,040 in 2021), which offset the negative natural balance of -40,640 (-45,220 in 2021),” INE announced. In 2022, the average number of children per woman of childbearing age rose to 1.43 (1.35 in 2021).
Demographic ageing in Portugal continued to increase, with the ageing index standing at 185.6 elderly people for every 100 young people in 2022 (181.3 in 2021). The median age of Portugal’s resident population, which corresponds to the age that divides the population into two groups of equal size, rose from 46.7 in 2021 to 47.0 in 2022.
According to INE’s gender breakdown, the population in December 2022 comprised 5,001,811 men and 5,465,555 women.
“The resident population has been increasing since 2019, in contrast to the downward trend in the population observed between 2010 and 2018,” adds INE. The population increase, recorded since 2019, is the result of the positive migratory balance (more immigrants than emigrants), which exceeded the negative natural balance (more deaths than live births).
