Press Release 16/06/2021

BIRTH STATISTICS. 2020

Births in the Basque Country fell by 4.4% in 2020

In December 2020 the drop exceeded 15%

In 2020 the number of births in the Basque Country stood at 14,739, down 4.4% on the previous year, according to Eustat data. The decline occurred mainly in the 4th quarter of the year, with 10.9% fewer births than the same period of 2019, it being especially pronounced in the months of November and December, which saw reductions of 12.4% and 15.1%, respectively.

Regarding the distribution by province, Álava saw the greatest decrease (-6.5%), followed by Bizkaia (-5.2%) and, lastly, Gipuzkoa (-2.1%), where the number of births stood at 2,397, 7,318 and 5,024, respectively.

The birth rate stood at 6.7 births per thousand inhabitants. The highest rate was in Álava (7.2‰), followed by Gipuzkoa (7.0‰) and Bizkaia (6.4‰). In the Basque Country this rate was down 0.3 points compared to 2019 and 3 points since 2010.

In 79.5% of births the mothers were aged 30 or over, a very similar result to 2019

As in the case of 2019, the largest group was women between 30 and 34 years old, who accounted for 35.0% of total births. This was followed by mothers aged between 35 and 39 with 33.7%.

The group of mothers aged 40 or over remained above 10% (10.8%), with a rise of 0.2 percentage points compared to the previous year. 13.8% of babies were born to mothers aged between 25 and 29, and 5.6% to mothers aged between 20 and 24. Finally, teenage mothers accounted for 1.1% of the total, two tenths down on the previous year.

28.5% of mothers were foreign nationals

Regarding nationality, 28.5% of mothers were foreign nationals, who gave birth to 4,207 girls and boys. In 2019 the percentage of foreign mothers was 27.4%. The main countries of origin of these mothers were: Morocco, with 750 mothers, Colombia (355), Nicaragua (299), Romania (291), Paraguay (205), Bolivia (196), (128), Pakistan (166), Honduras (150), Nigeria (147), Algeria (144), Venezuela (128), Ecuador (122) and Brazil (114).

Foreign mothers had children at a younger age than those of Spanish nationality resident in the Basque Country: in 39.8% of cases they had children under 30, compared to 12.8% of mothers of Spanish nationality.

The average age of mothers stood at 33.4 years, slightly higher than that of the previous year (33.3). This figure increased to 34.3 amongst those with Spanish nationality and was 31.1 for mothers of foreign nationality. The average age for first-time mothers – those who had their first child in 2020 – was 32.4.

The percentage of births outside marriage continued to increase

In 2020, the number of births outside marriage increased to 6,914, accounting for 46.9% of the total, whereas in 2019 it was 45.1%. Ten years ago, in 2010, the percentage of births registered outside marriage was 32.7%.

Regarding the order of birth, the 7,300 first-born children in 2020 made up 49.5% of the total; second-borns, 37.4%; and third-borns and subsequent children, 13% of the total. The sex ratio among live births in 2020 was 108 boys to every 100 girls. The average weights were 3,325 grams for boys and 3,210.5 grams for girls.

In terms of place of birth, it is worth noting that 89.8% of births took place in public hospitals, 9.6% in private hospitals and 0.6% were home-births. The number of births rose to 14,534, of which 14,272 were single, 261 twin and 1 triplet. Out of all births, 758 were premature (5.2%).

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