Cuban youths on the spotlight of sociological report

HAVANA, Cuba, Aug 18 (can) A recent report by the Center for Studies on the Youth revealed the trends of that population sector of Cuban society as to demographic, socio-cultural, labor and other factors between 2008 and 2012.

The report is based on data from the Cuban Annual books and the 2012 Population and Housing Census and underlines the falling trend in the number of young people, given the aging of the population, the low fertility and mortality rates, and a negative migration trend, meaning that more people leave the country than those who come.

In 2012 there were 105 persons over 60 years per every one hundred children, the report explains, while young population between 20 and 29 years of age reported growth in the period analyzed by the report, but there was decreasing number of people below 20 and over 30 years.

As to schooling and labor, those between 15 and 34 years reported a lowering registration trend at high school and higher education, with growing numbers in technical and agricultural courses. There were more young people working at state companies, though there was increasing trend in self-employment. This means that 57 percent of the Cuban youth was employed in 2012, with a total of 130 thousand 626 youngsters being self-employed workers.

Marriage has been postponed or replaced with consensual unions, which increased to over 30 percent between 1990 and 2012. The average reproduction age was calculated at about 26 years, though young women under 20 giving births increased since 2008 and abortion increased as well.

As to migration, first there was increasing trend of those moving inside the island´s provinces, with nearly 69 thousand citizens, 6.1 per every one thousand inhabitants. Eastern provinces are major source of internal migrants due to their lower development, according to the report.

And in the 2008-2012 period of time the external migration also showed increasing trend, with some 46 600 emigrants, 38, 2 of them being young people and 52 of them women, which is another factor affecting the reproductive capacity of the Cuban people.