Demographics of Finland
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Finland numbers some five million inhabitants and has an average population density of 17 inhabitants per square kilometre. This makes it, after Norway and Iceland, the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Population distribution is very uneven, population is concentrated on small southwestern coastal plain. About 60 per cent live in towns and cities, with 1.2 million living in Helsinki Metropolitan Area alone. In arctic Lapland, on the other hand, there are only 2 people to every square kilometre. The earliest inhabitants of most of the land area that makes up today's Finland and Scandinavia were in all likehood hunter-gatherers whose closest successors in modern terms would probably be the Sami people (formerly known as the Lapps). There are 4,500 of them living in Finland today and they are recognised as a minority with their own language. They have been living north of the Arctic Circle for more than 7,000 years now. In the 1960's many Finns abandoned rural areas for Sweden, while most immigrants into Finland itself come from other European countries. With 84 per cent of Finns in its congregation, the Lutheran church is the largest in the country. The official languages are Finnish and Swedish, the latter being the native language of about six per cent of the Finnish population. There is a historical explanation for the status of Swedish as an official language: from the 13th to the 19th century Finland was part of the Kingdom of Sweden.
Demographics
- Population: 5,223,442 (July 2005 est.)
- Life expectancy at birth: 78.35 years (2005 est.)
- *male: 74.82 years
- *female: 82.02 years
- Total fertility rate: 1.73 children born/woman (2005 est.)
Age structure
- 0-14 years: 17.3% (male 460,977; female 443,859)
- 15-64 years:66.8% (male 1,764,874; female 1,723,385)
- 65 years and over: 15.9% (male 328,952; female 501,395) (2005 est.)
- Population growth rate: 0.16% (2005 est.)
- Birth rate: 10.5 births/1,000 population (2005 est.)
- Death rate: 9.79 deaths/1,000 population (2005 est.)
- Net migration rate: 0.89 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2005 est.)
Ethnic groups
- Finnish 92 %
- Finland-Swedish 5.6 %
- Russians 0.6 %
- Roma 0.12%
- Sami 0.11%
- Finnish Tatars 0.02%
Languages
- Finnish language 93.4 % (official)
- Swedish language 5.9 % (official)
- Russian language 0.6 %
- Sami language 0.03% (semi-official)
Religions
- Evangelical Lutheran 83.1 % (Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland, state church)
- Russian Orthodox 1.2 % (Finnish Orthodox Church, second state church)
- other ca. 1.2 %
- none ca. 14.5 %
Literacy
- definition: age 15 and over can read and write
- total population: 100% (1980 est.)
References
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