The National Statistics Office (ONE) has issued its 2020 Demographic and Social Bulletin with new population trends. The 10.5 million population in the Dominican Republic is still relatively young, but the statistics show the average age of the population is rapidly increasing.
In 1950, the median age was 17.1 years, but by 2010 it had increased to 24.8 years. By 2025, ONE says that the median age here will be 29.4 years.
Furthermore, the Dominican senior population quadrupled from 1950 to 2010. People over 60 years went from being 4.4% of the population in 1950, to 8.6% in 2010 to an estimated 12% by 2025. People are living longer as there is improved nutrition and better health care. Moreover, families are having less children.
In 1950 those over 60 years were just 4.4% of the population, yet by 2010, the seniors had nearly doubled to 8.6%. In the short term, by 2025, seniors could reach 12% of the total population. By 2050, nearly 1 in 5 Dominicans will be 60 or older. Long term, by 2100, as much as a third of the people will be 60 or more.
Demographers note fertility rates increased after the dictator Trujillo’s assassination in 1961, and that trend continued until about the 1990s. Currently, the fertility rates are decreasing, as in much of the developed world.
Read more in Spanish:
National Statistics Office
20 December 2020