Bavaria’s population continues to grow – and it is getting older and more international. Around 13.9 million people will live in Bavaria in 2041, 714,000 more than today. Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann (CSU) presented this number on Thursday, it is the result of the annual population forecast by the State Statistical Office. This is significantly more than in previous calculations, which had also expected a decline.
But the reason for the growth is not that Bayern have so many children. On the contrary, since around the year 2000, significantly more people have died than have been born. In 2021, for example, a good 134,300 children were born and around 148,000 people died. This trend continues. “Therefore, the population growth of 5.4 percent expected for Bavaria by 2041 is clearly due to migration gains,” said Herrmann.
For many years now, more people have been coming to Bavaria than moving away. In 2022 the difference was particularly high because so many people fled the war in Ukraine. Not everyone will stay, but as of September 30, 2022, around 150,000 people with Ukrainian citizenship lived in Bavaria, more than five times as many as at the beginning of the year.
As early as 2023, statisticians estimate that significantly fewer people will come to Bavaria from the Ukraine, they expect around 42,000 people. Overall, the calculation shows that around 201,000 foreigners moved to Bavaria in 2022, and this year the number is expected to almost halve.
Without immigration, “Bavaria would lose five percent of its population in the next 20 years”
In the past ten years, Bavaria has experienced a migration gain of a good 1.12 million people, said Herrmann. Around 79,000 people have moved from other federal states, more than 1.04 million from abroad. “If that weren’t the case, Bavaria would lose five percent of its population over the next 20 years,” he said.
The so-called positive migration balance applies to all rural districts and urban districts, although it varies in magnitude. Nevertheless, the statisticians predict population declines for individual regions, especially in northern Bavaria. This in turn is because the number of deaths exceeds the number of births. “The development there cannot be offset by the increase in migration either,” said Herrmann.
Upper Franconia will be the only district with fewer inhabitants in 2041 than today
Upper Franconia hits hardest. The government district is the only one that is calculated to have fewer inhabitants in 2041 than today, the population there is expected to fall by 1.6 percent. However, this sounds less dramatic than in previous calculations. The statisticians had already predicted a population decline of almost ten percent for Upper Franconia. According to the 2008 calculation, the district of Wunsiedel should lose a fifth of its population by 2028. That didn’t come true. The figures for Wunsiedel now only show a decline of up to 7.5 percent by 2041. Herrmann spoke of a “stabilization of the situation” through the move.
Thomas Gößl, President of the State Office for Statistics, recognizes a trend of moving from the big city to the country. The Corona crisis has exacerbated this, since fewer students have moved to the cities and vice versa families have moved out. The state capital Munich in particular has lost residents, both to the immediate surrounding area and to more distant regions such as Lower Bavaria. This shows that many people assess the living conditions in rural areas just as well, said Gößl.
A total of 22 rural districts and urban districts are expected to have declining population figures, all of them in northern and eastern Bavaria. It could hit the Upper Franconian district of Kronach the hardest, where the population is expected to decrease by more than 7.5 percent.
Swabia is experiencing the greatest growth. 8.6 percent more people could live there in 2041, closely followed by Upper Bavaria. Despite its problematic border districts of Regen, Freyung-Grafenau and Deggendorf, Lower Bavaria is growing by seven percent, particularly strongly because of the city of Landshut. There, the statisticians expect growth of 17.6 percent.
However, what is needed above all is an influx of skilled workers. Herrmann called it a success that 11,000 Ukrainian refugees are already employed. This is a great success for the short period of time and shows the great potential.
Growth or not, Bayern are getting older. Admittedly, the number of under-20s will also increase slightly, with 166,000 young people living here by 2041. There are significantly more people over the age of 65. 753,000 could be counted in 2041. The average age will then increase by 1.3 to 45.4 years. In addition, the number of people of working age is falling. This shows that the demographic development still has problems in store.