Fertility rate slows and fewer people marry

The number of children born in Switzerland in 2011 was almost exactly the same as the previous year, but the number of children per woman fell.

Provisional population figures released by the Federal Statistics Office on Thursday showed the fertility rate had decreased from 1.54 children per woman in 2010, to 1.49 in 2011.

Fabienne Rausa of the office’s demography and migration section told the Swiss News Agency that the fall was the result of fewer births among foreign nationals in Switzerland, with the rate falling from 1.9 children born compared with 1.75 in 2010. Swiss fertility rates remained stable at 1.42.

Mothers were older too, with an average age of 31.4 compared with 31.2 in 2010.

In 2011 the total number of babies born was 80,300, just ten up on the previous year. Between 2005 and 2010 the number of births had increased by ten per cent.

There were 4.1 per cent fewer marriages compared with 2010, again with marriages among Swiss stable but those between foreign nationals or between Swiss and nationals of other countries falling by 6.9 and 7.8 per cent  respectively. The  number of registered partnerships also fell, as it has done since it was introduced in 2007. It was down by 50, to 670.

The mortality rate remained stable at 62,000.