Italy is facing a so-called “irreversible” problem, as hundreds of towns and villages have not witnessed any birth.
Zero births were registered in 358 villages and towns in 2023 – compared to 328 five years ago – according to the country’s National Statistics Institute.
Many small and isolated communities, often located in the Apennines and Alps, suffer from an aging population and a lack of spouses of reproductive age, leading to the closure of schools, clinics and post offices.
This in turn convinces more people to leave, either moving to cities or emigrating from Italy altogether.
“It’s a vicious circle,” said Alessandro Rosina, a demographics expert at the Catholic University of Milan. “The population is declining, services are being cut off, and young people are moving elsewhere.”
This demographic decline has been occurring for a decade, with the country entering a “new phase of inexorable population decline” in 2014, Rosina said.
“The interior areas are the most affected – the hard-to-reach communities, where access to health services and schools is difficult,” Mr. Rozina said, adding that the situation was “irreversible.”
Some villages only have a few dozen people. If a baby is born against all odds, it is a huge celebration and often makes headlines.
In December 2023, there was rejoicing in Morterone, the smallest village in Italy, with the birth of a baby girl named Marta. It raised the village’s population to 33.
Not only do the young people have no children, they aim to leave Italy altogether. More than a third of teenagers dream of immigrating to the United States, Spain and the United Kingdom.
Many live at home into their 20s and 30s, saying they can’t afford to move out and have children. Italy is the only developed country where real wages have fallen in the past 30 years.
In March last year, Istat reported that in 2023, the number of births in Italy would fall to 379,000 – a record low.
It is expected that by 2050, the country’s population of 58 million will decrease by five million. More than a third of them will be over 65 years of age, leading to workforce shortages and difficulties in funding social care.
