Russia’s Population Decline Solutions

Hussein Mansho 

AEP 2


In the unknown Author’s article,’ Russian Population in steep decline,” the author discusses the cusses of Russian population decline. First, the expectation of Russian population is about 134 million in 2015. The loss of people was 507,400 in the first eight months in 2000. Putin concerned about this problem. Second, the cusses of the population decline in Russia are drug use, alcoholism sexually transmitted diseases and psychological reasons. Furthermore, % 15 of Russian couples is infertile and 75% of women have medical problems during pregnancy. In Russia the fertility rate was 1. 7 in 1999.Also, in Russia the death rate is high while the birth rate is low. The life expectancy in Russia is 59 years for male while it is 72 years for female.

Russia can cope with its population decline by several ways. First, it should increase the birth rate. Second, it should decrease the death rate. Finally, it should allow immigration.

Russian government should make the birth rate increase in older to make its population grow by doing three things. First, it should provide Family- planning programs, which provide educational and clinical services that would help couples to take care of their children and make it easy for them to have more children. Second, the government should offer economic rewords to the couple which have more than two children or penalize the couples who their marriage last more than eight years with out having children. Finally, the government should make the average marriage age decrease because it is known that the couples tend to have more children if they get married earlier. Increasing the birth rate is the first step that Russia should do in older to make its population grow. 


Russia should make its death rate decrease in older to stop the sharp decline in its population by several ways. First, it should provide better health care system in order to make the life expectancy of its men higher and make its infant mortality rate lower. Second it should put high taxes on buying alcohol or cigarette in order to stop its people from drinking or smoking too much because alcohol and cigarette are the main cusses of the short men’s life expectancy in Russia. Also, it should effectively prevent it borders from smuggling drugs. Finally, it should not allow the abortion for pregnant women and it should stop the pharmacies from selling abortion drugs because the abortion percentage in Russia is high. Also the government should penalize women who use abortion to lose their infants. Decreasing the death rate is the second step that Russia should do in order to keep its population from declining. 


Migration is one of the most impotent factors that can play strong roles to decrease or increase the population. Therefore, the government in Russia should make it legal for foreign people to immigrate to it in order to increase its population. For example, it should allow for people who live in close countries such as Kazakhstan, Mongolia and China to immigrate to it. If the rule makers don’t want to change Russia's population structure, they can bring transitory workers by short-term contracts until its population back to grow again. For example, in Saudi Arabia the foreign workers come to it by short time visa in older to assure the governments that they will not stay forever, and their children can't get the nationally, even though they were born in it. Immigration is the second step that Russia should do in order to make its population grow.

Russian government has a lot to do in order to cope with its population declines. It should make its birth rate increase, make its death rate decrease and allow immigration. Russia economy is growing. Therefore, it should make its population grow in order to cover the gap between its economy growth and its population decline. Also, its huge land needs more people to build it and to get the benefit from it. Also, Russia should educate its people about alcoholism and smoking heath effects. If Russia gets over this issue, it will back to its old position in the world with all of the oil and gas wealth that it has.

Reference:
Russian population in steep decline. (2000, October 24). BBC NEWS. Retrieved
February 3, 2009, from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/988723.stm