Demographics of Argentina

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This article is about the demographic features of the population of Argentina, including population density, ethnicity, economic status and other aspects of the population.

Contents 1 Origins and ethnicity 1.1 Colonies 1.2 Indigenous peoples 1.3 Emigration 2 Population dynamics 3 Demographic distribution 4 Economic status 5 Linguistic survey 6 Foreign languages 6.1 Italian 6.2 English 6.3 German 6.4 Levantine Arabic 6.5 Welsh 7 Genetic Studies 7.1 Average composition of the Argentine genome (Avena et al, 2006) 7.2 Amerindian Ancestors (Corach-UBA, 2005) 7.3 Average composition of the Argentine genome (Seldin et al, U. California 2006) 7.4 African Ancestors (CGFyL-UBA, 2005) 8 Demographic statistics from the CIA World Factbook 8.1 Population 8.2 Age structure 8.3 Median age 8.4 Annual population growth rate 8.5 Birth rate 8.6 Death rate 8.7 Net migration rate 8.8 Sex ratio 8.9 Infant mortality rate 8.10 Life expectancy at birth 8.11 Total fertility rate 8.12 HIV/AIDS 8.13 Ethnic groups 8.14 Religions 8.15 Languages 8.16 Literacy 9 See also 10 References 11 Sources

Origins and ethnicity

Main article: Immigration to Argentina

Argentina, along with other areas of new settlement like Canada, Australia or New Zealand is a melting pot of different peoples, both autochthonous and immigrants. Citizens of predominant European descent make up the great majority of the population, with estimates varying from 89.7%^[1] to 97%^[2] of the total population. The last national census, based on self-ascription, indicated a similar figure, in that only 2% declared to be Amerindian of first-generation Mestizo.

The most common ethnic groups are Italian and Spaniard (mostly Galicians and Basques). There are also significant Germanic, Slavic, British and French populations.

Waves of immigrants from European countries arrived in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The main contributors were Spain, Italy, France (mostly settled in Buenos Aires city and province), Eastern European nations such as Croatia, Poland, Russia, Romania, Ukraine and the Balkans (especially Greece, Serbia and Montenegro), Switzerland, Germany, the United Kingdom and Ireland (Buenos Aires and Patagonia), and Scandinavia (especially Sweden). Smaller waves of settlers from Australia, South Africa and the United States are recorded in Argentine immigration records. By the 1910s, over 30 percent of the country's population was non-native Argentine after immigration rates peaked, and half of Buenos Aires' population was foreign-born.^[3][4]

The overwhelming majority of Argentina's Jewish community (about 2% of the population) derives from immigrants of Northern, Central, and Eastern European origin (Ashkenazi Jews). Argentina's Jewish population is by far the largest Jewish community in all of Latin America and is the fifth largest in the world. Buenos Aires itself is said to have 100,000 practicing Jews, making it one of the largest Jewish urban centers in the world (see also History of the Jews in Argentina).

Small numbers of people from Asia have also settled Argentina, mainly in Buenos Aires. The first Asian-Argentines were of Japanese descent, but Koreans, Vietnamese, Chinese and Laotians soon followed.

Colonies

Most immigrants, regardless of origin, settled in the city of Buenos Aires or around (Greater Buenos Aires or Buenos Aires Province). However, in the first stages of immigration, some formed colonies (especially agricultural colonies) in other parts of the country, often encouraged by the Argentine government and/or sponsored by private individuals and organizations.

Many Scandinavian, British (English and Scottish) and Irish immigrants settled in Patagonia; today, the Chubut Valley has a significant Welsh-descended population and retains many aspects of Welsh culture. But since the 1980s, many Welsh Argentines began to emigrate to Canada and Australia.

German and Swiss colonies settled in the provinces of Entre Ríos, Misiones, Formosa, Córdoba Province and Patagonia, as well as in Buenos Aires itself. As many as 8 million may be of German ancestry, third largest after Italian and Spanish.

Immigration from the Chilean island of Chiloé made up much of the Chilean immigration to the southern region of Patagonia during the late 19th century.

Indigenous peoples

See also: Argentine Amerindians

According to the provisional data of INDEC's Complementary Survey of Indigenous Peoples (ECPI) 2004 - 2005,^[5] 402,921 indigenous persons (about 1% of the total population) reside in Argentina. An additional 4.5% are labeled as Mestizo.^[6]

Emigration

The rate of Argentine emigration to Europe (especially to Spain and Italy^[7]) and, to a lesser degree, to North America (mostly to Mexico, the United States and Venezuela) peaked in the late 1970s and early 1980s and is noteworthy.

Population dynamics

In 2001 census [INDEC], Argentina had a population of 36,260,130 million inhabitants, of which 1,527,320, or 4.2%, were born abroad. The population growth rate in 2008 was estimated to be 0.917% annually, with a birth rate of 16.32 live births per 1,000 inhabitants and a mortality rate of 7.54 deaths per 1,000 inhabitants. The net migration rate is a modestly positive, 0.39 immigrants per 1,000 inhabitants, though Argentina is the only Latin American state receiving net immigration. The proportion of people under 15, at 24.6%, is a little below the world average (28%); but the cohort of people 65 and older is relatively high, at 10.8%. The percentage of senior citizens in Argentina has long been second only to Uruguay in Latin America and well above the world average (currently 7%).

The Argentine population has long had one of Latin America's lowest growth rates (recently, about one percent a year) and it also enjoys a comparatively low infant mortality rate. The median age is approximately 29 years and life expectancy at birth is of 75 years. Unlike most developed countries, Argentina does not yet have sub-replacement fertility and the worries and problems associated with it.

Demographic distribution

Main article: List of cities in Argentina by population

Eighty percent of the Argentine population resides in cities or towns of more than two thousand inhabitants, and over one-third lives in the Greater Buenos Aires area. With 11.5 million inhabitants, this sprawling metropolis serves as the focus for national life. This population is unequally distributed across the country, centering in the zone of the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area or "Greater Buenos Aires" (Autonomous City of Buenos Aires and Conurbano Buenos Aires) approximately 12 million people, equivalent to 33% of the total population. This makes Buenos Aires the tenth megalopolis of the 23 existing ones into the world, and the third urban agglomerate of Latin America, behind Mexico City and Sao Paulo.

An additional 1.1 million people live in the metropolitan area of Rosario, and 1.3 million in the city of Córdoba. Most of the Argentine population lives in the corresponding provinces (Buenos Aires, Santa Fe and Córdoba). In 1989, the Argentine government voted but never got to construct a master-planned capital in Viedma near the coastal city of Bahía Blanca, in order to generate development in the central provinces.

The Province of Buenos Aires is the most populated province of the country with 13,827,203 inhabitants (37% of the national population), of which 9.7 million live in Great Buenos Aires and 4.5 millions in the rest of the province. With a similar quantity of population, the neighboring provinces follow Buenos Aires Province in magnitude (in the northern part) of Córdoba and Santa Fe with populations of around 3 million and the City of Buenos Aires with 2.7 million. In total, 60% of the population is concentrated in a region integrated by three provinces (Buenos Aires, Cordoba, Santa Fe) and the City of Buenos Aires with a surface area less than 22% of the country.

Far from the pointed figures, the provinces that approximately reunite a million inhabitants are Chaco, Corrientes, Entre Rios, Misiones, Salta, Tucumán and Mendoza, overcoming the latter the million and inhabitants' way. Tucumán province emphasizes in this group, with a density of population of 60 hab/km², top that of provinces more populated as Cordoba and Santa Fe and even to the average of the province of Buenos Aires.

Regarding the territorial distribution of the population, the most significant information of the 2001 Census is the decreasing growth of the population of Buenos Aires, which has decreased from second place to fourth place, being overcome by Cordoba and Santa Fe. Also it is prominent that Patagonia is the region with major demographic growth indicating a slow displacement of the population of the country towards the south.

Metropolitan areas by population

Rank	Core City	Province	Pop.	Rank	Core City	Province	Pop.	Buenos Aires Córdoba
1	Buenos Aires	Buenos Aires	15,052,177	11	Resistencia	Chaco	452,800
2	Córdoba	Córdoba	1,613,211	12	Neuquén	Neuquén	400,600
3	Rosario	Santa Fe	1,325,090	13	Santiago del Estero	Santiago del Estero	397,200
4	Mendoza	Mendoza	1,109,104	14	Corrientes	Corrientes	342,400
5	La Plata	Buenos Aires	957,800	15	Avellaneda	Buenos Aires	328,980
6	Tucumán	Tucumán	903,100	16	Bahía Blanca	Buenos Aires	310,200
7	Mar del Plata	Buenos Aires	706,600	17	Río Cuarto	Córdoba	144,021
8	Salta	Salta	556,400	18	Comodoro Rivadavia	Chubut	140,628
9	Santa Fe	Santa Fe	534,300	19	Santa Rosa	La Pampa	110,640
10	San Juan	San Juan	498,400	20	Zárate	Buenos Aires	101,271
2006 estimation[8]

Economic status

Main article: Economy of Argentina

Argentines enjoy comparatively high standards of living compared to other Latin American countries; most of the population considers itself middle class^[9] and the country has a high Human Development Index score of 0.869. As of 2008, 20.6% of the population is under the official poverty line^[10]and income distribution has become considerably unequal as a result of the 2001 economic crisis.

The educational level is good, at least in urban areas with ready access to public schools and universities. The Argentine literacy rate is very high (99%).^[11]

In the countryside huge ranches, called estancias, cover much of the Pampa and Patagonia, many of which are the legacy of agricultural colonies established by European immigration during the 19th century.

Some rural people work on estancias, while others own small farms. The soybean boom, the exportation of certain cereals, meats, wines and other fruits, have turned the Argentine countryside into a very profitable business, causing some city people to leave urban areas in search of a more tranquil quality of life.^[12]

Linguistic survey

Main article: Languages of Argentina

The official language of Argentina is Spanish, and it is spoken by practically the entire population in several different dialects, each having various degrees of Italian and Spanish influences. The most common dialect of Spanish in Argentina is Rioplatense Spanish, and it is so named because it evolved in the central areas around the Río de la Plata basin. Rioplatense Spanish is the standard form of Spanish as used by the Argentine media. Its distinctive feature is widespread voseo, the use of the pronoun vos instead of tú for the second person singular.

Preliminary research has shown that Rioplatense Spanish, and particularly the speech of the city of Buenos Aires, has intonation patterns that resemble those of Italian dialects^[13], most closely resembling Neapolitan. This correlates well with immigration patterns. Argentina, and particularly Buenos Aires, had huge numbers of Italian settlers since the 19th century.

Italian influence is shown mainly in vocabulary, lingo and intonation. In addition to Rioplatense Spanish, people of the province of Córdoba have a distinctive intonation pattern. Along the Brazilian border it is quite common to hear a mixture of Portuguese and Spanish called Portuñol.

Some few in the littoral provinces of the north-east speak Guaraní, an Amerindian language, usually mixing it with Spanish. Guaraní as a second language is understood at varying degrees by 3.7% of Argentinians,^[14] and holds official status alongside Spanish in the province of Corrientes. Quechua, another Amerindian language, is also spoken by some people but is confined primarily to Santiago del Estero.

Foreign languages

Many Argentines also speak other European languages (Italian, Portuguese, French, German and Serbo-Croatian, as examples) due to the vast number of immigrants from Europe that came to Argentina.^[2] Due to the linguistic influences of Rioplatense Spanish from Italian, the average Argentine is well-positioned to understand that language to a substantial degree.

Italian

See also: Italian settlement in Argentina

Argentina has more than 1,500,000 Italian speakers;^[15] this tongue is the second most spoken language in the nation. Italian immigration from the second half of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century made a lasting and significant impact on the pronunciation and vernacular of the nation's spoken Spanish, giving it an Italian flare. In fact, Italian has contributed so much to Rioplatense that many foreigners mistake it for Italian.^[16]

English

See also: English settlement in Argentina

English language is a required subject in many schools, and there are also many private English-teaching academies and institutions. Young people have become accustomed to English through movies and the Internet, and knowledge of the language is also required in certain jobs, so most middle-class children and teenagers now speak, read and/or understand it with various degrees of proficiency. According to an official cultural consumption survey conducted in 2006, 42.3% of Argentinians claim to know some English (though only 15.4% of those claimed to have a high level of English comprehension).^[14]

German

See also: German settlement in Argentina

Standard German is spoken by between 400,000^[17] and 500,000^[18] Argentines of German ancestry, though it has also been stated that the there could be as many as 2,800,000.^[19] German today, is the third or fourth most spoken language in Argentina.

Levantine Arabic

There are sources of around one million Levantine Arabic speakers in Argentina,^[17] as a result of immigration from the Middle East, mostly from Syria and Lebanon.

Welsh

See also: Languages of Argentina

There is a small but prosperous community of Argentine Welsh-speakers of approximately 25,000^[20] in the province of Chubut, in the Patagonia region, who descend from 19th century immigrants.

Genetic Studies

Average composition of the Argentine genome (Avena et al, 2006)

A group of researchers belonging to diverse scientific Argentine and French institutions (CONICET, UBA, Centres D'Anthropologie de Toulouse)^[21],on the base of information gathered in the Hospital of Clinics and Italian of the City of Buenos Aires, concluded that:

• The genetic average admixture of the Argentine population, contains 79.9 % of European contribution, 15.8% Amerindian and 4.3% African.

Amerindian Ancestors (Corach-UBA, 2005)

The "Servicio de Huellas Digitales Genéticas" of University of Buenos Aires concluded in 2005 a research directed by the Argentine geneticist Daniel Corach (realized on 320 individuals of 9 provinces) from genetic scoreboards established that 56% of the Argentine population has at least one Amerindian ancestor. The study indicates that the genetic Amerindian characteristic, not necessarily demonstrates physical visible feature. From this percentage, only 10% of the population has exclusively Amerindian ancestors. The remaining 44% of the total population, does not have Amerindian ancestry.^[22]

Average composition of the Argentine genome (Seldin et al, U. California 2006)

A group of researchers belonging to diverse scientific Argentine, North American, Swedish, and Guatemalan institutions, directed by Michael F. Seldin of University of California^[23], concluded that:

• The genetic average structure of the Argentine population contains 78% of European contribution, 19.4% Amerindian and 2.5% African (using the Bayesian algorithm).

African Ancestors (CGFyL-UBA, 2005)

A research of Centro de Genética de Filosofía y Letras of the University of Buenos Aires established in 2005, after analyzed 500 blood samples in the Italian Hospital, Hospital of Clinics, and the Regional Medical Center of the city of La Plata, that 4.3% of the analyzed samples corresponding to inhabitants of greater Buenos Aires contains genetic African scoreboards (though it is not observed at the phenotypical level).^[24]

Demographic statistics from the CIA World Factbook

The following demographic statistics are from the CIA World Factbook.

Population

40,301,927 (June 2007 est.)

Age structure

0-14 years: 24.9% (male 5,134,958/female 4,905,181)

15-64 years: 15-64 years: 64.4% (male 12,979,588/female 12,967,507)

65 years and over: 10.7% (male 1,769,593/female 2,545,100) (2007 est.)

Median age

Total: 29.7 years

Male: 28.8 years

Female: 30.7 years (2006 est.)

Annual population growth rate

0.96% (2006 est.)

Birth rate

16.73 births/1,000 population (2006 est.)

Death rate

7.55 deaths/1,000 population (2006 est.)

Net migration rate

0.4 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2006 est.)

Sex ratio

At birth: 1.05 male(s)/female

Under 15 years: 1.05 male(s)/female

15-64 years: 1 male(s)/female

65 years and over: 0.7 male(s)/female

Total population: 0.97 male(s)/female (2006 est.)

Infant mortality rate

Total: 12.9 deaths/1,000 live births (2006)^[25]

Life expectancy at birth

Total population: 76.32 years

Male: 72.60 years

Female: 80.24 years (2006 est.)

Total fertility rate

2.16 children born/woman (2006 est.)

HIV/AIDS

Adult prevalence rate: 0.7% (2001 est.)

People living with HIV/AIDS: 130,000 (2001 est.)

Deaths: 1,500 (2003 est.)

Ethnic groups

European descent (mostly Spanish and Italian) 97%^[2]

Mestizo (European/Amerindian ancestry), Amerindian, or other non-white groups represent the remainder

Religions

^[26]

Main article: Religion in Argentina

Roman Catholic 90%,

Protestant 5%,

Muslims 1.5%,

Jews 0.8%,

other religious groups 2.5%,

Languages

Spanish (official; most spoken dialect: Rioplatense Spanish).

Languages spoken by members of ethnic groups/communities: English, Italian, German, French^[2], Yiddish, Russian, Polish, Welsh, Armenian and Serbo-Croatian.

Portuguese (near Brazilian border)

Guaraní (official in Corrientes; spoken also in northeastern litoral areas, near Paraguayan border.

Quechua (in decline, found in the northwest provinces, primarily in Santiago del Estero).

Literacy

Literacy (as defined as individuals of age 15 and over who can read and write):

Total population: 97.2%

male: 97.2%

female: 97.2% (2001 est.)

See also

• Argentina
• Immigration in Argentina
• Ethnography of Argentina
• White Argentine
• Italian settlement in Argentina
• Spanish settlement in Argentina
• Basque settlement in Argentina
• German settlement in Argentina
• Welsh settlement in Argentina
• English settlement in Argentina
• Irish settlement in Argentina
• Swedish settlement in Argentina
• Montenegrins in Argentina
• Ukrainians of Argentina
• White Latin American

References

Sources

Demographics of South America Sovereign states Argentina · Bolivia · Brazil · Chile · Colombia · Ecuador · Guyana · Panama1 · Paraguay · Peru · Suriname · Trinidad and Tobago1 · Uruguay · Venezuela Dependencies Aruba1 / Netherlands Antilles1 (Netherlands) · Falkland Islands / South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands (UK) 2 / French Guiana (France) 1 Territories also in or commonly reckoned elsewhere in the Americas (North America and/or Central America).  2 Territories also in or commonly reckoned to be in Antarctica.