English

Belarus faces growing gender imbalance

There were 1,150 women per 1000 men in Belarus in October 2009, Alena Kukharevich, deputy chairwoman of the National Statistics Committee, told reporters in Minsk on Wednesday, as quoted by BelaPAN.

She referred to the findings of the national census conducted that month.

She said that there had been much more women than men in Belarus after World War II but the gender imbalance had been evening out until 1999. There were 1,249 women per 1000 men in 1959, 1,156 women in 1979 and 1,129 in 1999.

The official linked the imbalance to men's higher mortality rate.

There were some 4,420,000 men and 5,084,000 women living in Belarus in October 2009. The country's male population shrank by 6.3 percent and female population by 4.6 percent compared with 1999.

There are more young women than men in urban localities and vice versa in rural areas, according to Ms. Kukharevich.

"The gender imbalance results in a shortage of brides in rural areas," she said, adding that there were 853 women aged between 20 and 29 per 1000 men of the same age in villages.