Spanish population drops for first time in 17 years thanks to foreigners' exodus

SPAIN The registered population of Spain totals 47,059,533 inhabitants, which is 205,788 less than in 2012, and attributable to a 3.8% drop in the number of registered foreigners. This is the first time the population has dropped since 1996, the first year official statistics were published. The number of registered foreigners came down by 216,125 (that 3.8%) through 2012, and now total 5,520,133, while the number of Spanish-born was up by 10,337 (or 0.02%). This according to the Nastional Statistic Institute's Continuous Register, which also says that 11.7% of all people registered in Spain are foreigners, and 2.4 million come from the European Union.>>>

Population comparisons for all seven Campo municipalities plus Gibraltar

Click to enlarge

CAMPO DE GIBRALTAR The data on this graph is from a couple of years ago but it hasn't changed that much, despite the exodus of numerous foreign residents (many of whom never bothered to register anyway, and about which another article soon). We included Gibraltar in the Campo not for any political reasons but because it is a population centre of some significance in the area - Rock residents please refrain from indignation.

Brits make up 7% of population

San Roque outlined in red

SAN ROQUE (Agencies) The municipality has passed the 30,000 residents barrier - to 30,441, according to the municipal statistics services. Of these, 17%, or 5,145 are foreigners of 85 different nationalities. There are residents from 26 of the 27 European Union countries, and the British account for almost 7% (2,099) of the total. Another 12% are from EU countries. There are also 47 citizens of the European Economic Area: 43 Norwegians and 4 from Iceland. Switzerland, as a member of the European Free Trade Association, accounts for 36 registered inhabitants, while other Europeans are: Russian (34); Ukranian (23); Moldavia (7); Serbia (7); and a single Andorran.>>>

La Línea population reaches 70,000 for the first time in fifty years

LA LINEA (Agencies) For the first time in five decades the population of La Línea de la Concepción has spilled over the 70,000 mark, a number not reached since the frontier with Gibraltar was closed by the Franco regime in 1969, when some 20,000 people left the town. The Councillor temporarily in charge of these things, Manuel Aguilera, was unable to specify if the increase was due to births or residents of foreign countries or other provinces deciding to live there. Aguilera said he was still analyzing the computrerised regter, but he knew that "Number 70,000 was a foreigner." In general, figures show that the population has been increasing steadily for a number of years; on January 1, 2000,there were 59.993 inhabitants, on January 1, 2010, the number was 64,645. These figures come from the official Census, which lags a little behind the Town Hall figures, which adjusts them as people register.

Foreigners registered in Spain down by 0.3%

Foreigners as percentage

SPAIN (Agencies) The overall population of Spain has increased by 0.3%, for a population of 47,150,819 inhabitants. Of these, 5.7 million are registered foreign nationals, representing 12.2% of the total. The number of foreigners, though, has gone down by 0.3%, according to an advance report from Instituto Nacional de Estadística (INE, National Statistics Institute). The number of foreigners coming to live here from the European Union increased by 42,319 (to a total of 2.3 million), while those from outside the EU decreased by 59,386, to a total of 3.33 million. The largest number of EU residents are Rumanians (864,278which grew by 4% to 33,043. They are followed by the British (390,880) and Germans (195,842). As for non-EU nationals, the Moroccans head the list with 769,920), followed by Ecuadorians (359,076) and Colombians (271,773). Pakistanis and Chinese have also registered significant increases, 22.8% and 5% respectively.

Only 211 foreigners ready to vote in local elections

ALGECIRAS (Agencies) The electoral roll was published recently, announcing the residents who are elegible to vote in the coming local elections of May 22. The list shows only 211 foreigners, against 87,333 Spanish residents in the municipality. According to local sources, this could mean that most of the over 11,500 included in the last census had not registered at the Town Hall. Residents of non-Spanish nationality represented over 100 different countries and 10% of the population in Algeciras. The same sources report that many foreigners have left the town as a result of the crisis, a fact not registered by the census of 2001.

Brits lead provincial foreign residents stats; spectacular growth in number of foreign nationals and bad news for provincial capital

CÁDIZ PROVINCE The latest figures to come from the National Statistics Institute, which go back to the beginning of 2010 on this subject, say that the number of foreign residents in the province more than quadrupled in ten years: from 10,350 in 2000 to 47.767 in 2010. If they/we all lived in the same town, it would be the ninth lagest in the povince. The British community leads the ranking with 8,745, concentrated principally in the Campo de Gibraltar, followed closely by Moroccans (7,449), mainly in the Bay of Cadiz and in the Jerez areas. Other significant shifts upwards include>

Foreign residents in Spain, 12.3% of population

SPAIN (Agencies / Photo collage: CampoPulse files) Foreign residents in Spain make up 12.3% of the total population, almost double that of the rest of the EU (6.4%) according to a survey by Eurostat, the Community statistics agency. According to the agency's data, as of January 1, 2009, there were 5.65 million residents of another nationality in Spain, of which 2.27 million (5%) were from another EU member country, the remaining 3.37 million (7.4%) came from a country outside the EU. In absolute numbers, Spain is, after Germany (over 7 million foreigners), the EU country with most foreign residents, followed by the UK, France and Italy.

10% of Campo population is foreign

(Agencies) The population of the Campo de Gibraltar continues to grow, according to the Instituto Nacional de Estadística (INE, National Statistics Institute). Figures for 2009 show that there are 263,749 inhabitants, an increase of 0.90% from 2008. This represents 2,371 new residents, of which 1,083 are foreigners - that is 45.6% of all newcomers to the area. All the area's municipalities registered an increase in foreign population, as follows:>