BACKGROUND: Since the mid-1970s, countries in both Eastern and Western Europe as well as the Slavic republics of the former USSR (Russia, Ukraine and Belarus) have experienced a steady and accelerating decline in population, leading to aging and a shortage of workforce, especially in low paid and unqualified branches of the economy, as well as increasingly, problems with conscripts to military service. In Western Europe, this led to the migration to Europe of more than fifteen million immigrants, mainly from Turkey, francophone Arab countries and Eastern European countries. Still, the enlarged European Union of 25 members and 350 million people will be in need of millions of new workforce in coming decade in order to sustain the system of social welfare and pensions. It will also be of critical importance to the EU and U.S. national security interests to maintain at least status-quo and stability along the borders of the former Soviet Union, experiencing an enormous demographic pressure by the Chinese population of 1.3 billion, India’s over 1 billion, and 350 million Muslims in the countries of South Asia and the Middle East. Most vulnerable in this regard is Russia. In 1992, the Russian Federation was home to 148 million inhabitants, which has shrunk to 145 million in 2003 in spite of in-migration of more than 9 million immigrants from other republics of the former USSR in the 1990s. In contrast, the Chinese population is increasing by 16-18 millions a year, and India’s by more than 20 millions. This contrast is even more striking, if one bears in mind that Pakistan today has a larger population than Russia, and compares to Moscow by being a member of the nuclear weapons club. Russian statistics suggest that by 2030, its population will decrease just to 121 million. Similarly, Ukraine presently has 47 million inhabitants, but the projected figure for 2030 is 38 million. The vast landmasses of the Russian Far East and Siberia, but also Central Russian regions like Ivanovo, Kostroma and others, as well as Ukraine, will increasingly need workforce to keep operating their economies, and even get conscripts to their armies. By contrast, Central Asian republics have a positive trend of population growth. Educated by secular European standards of the former USSR, they might provide a midterm solution (up to 2025-2030) to the demographic problems and border security of the former USSR and OSCE area, by bringing 60 to 80 million relatively young, modern educated citizens to this demographic equation.

IMPLICATIONS: Of the five Central Asian republics, only three will have population growth in the period up to 2030: Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Kazakhstan, according to recent study by the U.S. Population Reference Bureau, will have just 12 million in 2030, down from 14.9 million today. Turkmenistan, due to the reportedly very high percentage of drug addiction among the male population, which is spreading to the female population, will be unlikely to produce any substantial change of the population from today’s 4.7 million. The current policy, amounting to a total destruction of the national education system, is also unlikely to leave a significant niche for Turkmen citizens in the future competitive job markets of unified Europe, or for that matter of Russia. In contrast, Tajikistan’s population could increase from the current 6.6 million to 10.5 million by 2030; Kyrgyzstan’s from 5 million to 7.3 million; and Uzbekistan’s from 26 million to 40.2 million. The combined population of Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan of 55-60 million can therefore be expected to make a real difference in achieving demographic stability in Russia and Ukraine, and a minor role in other European countries. This can play a critically important role in maintaining the status-quo of external borders of the OSCE area, the ‘wider’ Euro-Atlantic Home from Vancouver to Vladivostok, as advocated by some politicians in the late 1980s. The negative demographic tendencies in Russia, and the realization at the highest levels that it will be impossible to reverse it by government actions, have already led the Russian defense ministry to call on citizens of CIS countries to join the Russian military in exchange for higher pay and speeded up approval of citizenship of the Russian Federation.

CONCLUSIONS: Demographics matter in the dynamic changes in a volatile world order. Long-standing understandings of threats and challenges to national security are being re-evaluated, but the basic factors of geostrategic stability remain, such as the integrity of strategic borders and states’ ability to run their national economies and to ensure the defense of their national territories. In all these aspects, population is of critical importance. The United States and the enlarged European Union would not welcome the prospect of having a common border with China or with unstable and volatile countries of South Asia and the Middle East, some empowered by Russian military hardware and nuclear know-how – whether in these countries or in the Ural mountains. The population potential of Central Asia, formed by the experience of being part of the European and Soviet heritage, could prove to be a key resource in maintaining the current status-quo in the external borders of the OSCE member countries for the coming 20-25 years. However, after this period, even the population of Central Asian republics is likely to follow the European demographic trend of low birth rates and a stagnation of population growth. The demographic potential of Central Asia is likely to be an important and useful resource in maintaining strategic stability in Eurasia in the coming three decades.

AUTHOR’S BIO: Abraham Cohen is a freelance journalist based in Bloomington, Indiana, specializing in Central Asian and Middle Eastern Affairs.