site.btaRegional Demographer Sounds Alarm about Dramatic Depopulation of Vast Parts of Bulgaria

The area of Bulgaria's demographic wildernesses (populated by fewer than 10 residents per sq km) is growing at double the pace at which the country's population is decreasing. Enormous parts of Bulgaria are already depopulated, and the people there are gradually dying out, mainly because of advanced population ageing and the lack of births in some settlements. Not a single child has been born over the last 30 years in some areas.

The alarming news was broken by Assoc. Prof. Nikolay Tsekov of the Institute for Population and Human Studies at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, who presented a monitoring of the depopulation cores in Bulgaria in the 2001-2021 period at a news conference here on Friday.

Replying to a reporter's question, Tsekov specified that the areas worst affected by depopulation are Western and Northwestern Bulgaria, Mt Strandzha and Mt Sakar in the Southeast, the Central Balkan Range, and the cities of Gabrovo and Lovech (Central Bulgaria). He is particularly concerned by the fact that even areas with excellent prospects for agricultural production, like Dobrich Region in the Northeast, rank among the regions with the fastest growing number and areas of depopulated mayoralties.

"If the depopulation of rural areas continues to increase at this pace, some Bulgarian cities will be overpopulated, without sufficient kindergartens and congested with cars, while enormous parts of the country are steadily losing population and resources, their economic assets depreciate, and they cannot attract investors' interest, which results in the unavailability of jobs and livelihood in these parts," the regional demographer emphasized.

"Investors and settlers need to be found after developing 'model settlements' in several areas with a view to attracting people to live there," Tsekov said in conclusion.