MARRIAGE STATISTICS. II/2020

The restrictions due to the pandemic caused a 79.1% drop in marriages in the Basque Country in the second quarter of 2020

In April there were only 14 weddings and in May 87

In the second quarter of 2020 the figure for marriages in the Basque Country stood at 455, which was a drop of 79.1% compared to the same quarter of the previous year, according to Eustat data.

In previous years there were more than 2,000 weddings in the second quarter; however, this year, due to the COVID-19 crisis, the number of weddings has dropped drastically, above all in April and May, when there were only 14 and 87 weddings, respectively.

The number of marriages decreased in all three provinces, given that in Álava there were only 51 weddings (-80.5%), in Gipuzkoa 157 (-80.1%) and in Bizkaia 225 (-78.6%). On the other hand, 22 couples fixed their residency outside the Basque Country.

Of the total number of marriages, 23 were between people of the same sex (8 between men and 15 between women) and the remaining 432 were heterosexual marriages.

During the second quarter of 2020, practically all weddings were civil, given that there were only 9 canonical weddings. The percentage of civil weddings was 7.7 points higher than in the same period of 2019.

Of the 455 marriages in the second quarter of 2019, 428 men and 445 women resident in the Basque Country married. For 340 spouses (79.4%) this was their first marriage, whilst 6 widowers and 82 divorcees remarried. The percentage of first weddings for women was similar to that for men: the number of single women who married stood at 346 (77.8%), 6 widows and 93 divorcees.

The percentage of foreign nationals entering into marriage doubled

With respect to the distribution according to the age of the couple, 92.3% of husbands and 87.9% of wives were older than 30. In the same period of 2019, this percentage was 90.8% for men and 83.8% for women.

In the months of April, May and June 2020, 19.2% of recently married men and 25.2% of recently married women were foreign nationals. With regards to the same quarter of the previous year, the percentage of men increased by 10.2 percentage points and that of women by 12.9 points.

For further information:

Eustat - Euskal Estatistika Erakundea / Basque Statistics Institute C/ Donostia-San Sebastián, 1 01010 Vitoria-Gasteiz Press service: servicioprensa@eustat.es Tel: 945 01 75 62

Product data