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Serbiа is a country located in South East Europe (Balkan Peninsula). In Serbia, there are a total of 6158 settlements out of which 5822 are registered as settlements with municipality status. The City of Belgrade is the capital of the country. The total land area is 88 499 square kilometers. The information on average population density is available only for specific regions, but not for the country as a whole. Belgrade is the region with the largest population density with 523 inhabitants per km2. The region of Southern and Eastern Serbia the least densely inhabited area.
Source: Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia
The population decline was not regionally uniform. The greatest depopulation is recorded in the region of Eastern and Southern Serbia (-19.4% in twenty years), then in Šumadija (-10.4%), Vojvodina (-4.1%), while an increase in population of 3.6% is recorded in Belgrade. Current distribution of the population by regions is uniform.
Male population makes up 48.7% and female 51.3% of the total population. Along with the population decline, the process of population aging occurs. In the period of twenty years, there has been a decline in the share of the population up to the age of fourteen and the increase in population aged over 65. On the one hand, this process can be explained by the general demographic trends that characterise the developed countries, but primarily by wars and emigration from the country of predominantly young population, who “carried” with them future generations as well.
Source: Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia
In the period of twenty years, there has been a decrease in fertility and an increase in the mortality rates of the population. This was particularly pronounced in the last decade of the twentieth century, when the political and economic crisis, in the context of war, was acute.
Source: Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia
By the ethnic composition 83.3% of the population are Serbs, 3.5% Hungarians, 2.1% Roma, 2% Bosniaks, 0.8% Croats, 0.7% Slovaks, 0.5% Montenegrians, 0.5 % Vlachs, 0.4% Romanians, 0.3% Yugoslavs, 0.3% Macedonians, 0.3% Muslims and around 5% other.
According to the data from September 2019, the total number of registered employees was 2 182 000, where 2 111 000 of them are employees at legal entities (companies, enterprises, cooperatives, institutions and other organizations) and persons performing activities for own account, entrepreneurs and their employees and 70 000 are registered individual agricultural producers (farmers).
According to the data from the third quarter of 2019, the total number of registered employees was 2 938 700 and unemployees 308 400. Employment rate for that period was 49.6% and unemployment rate 9.5%.
When it comes to number of immigrants, according to the data from 2016, 125 682 immigrants were living in the territory of the Republic of Serbia. Most of them identify themselves as Serbs (62956), while others identify themselves with the nationality of the bordering countries (Montenegro, Hungary, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Bulgaria etc.).
According to the data from 2018, 122 193 inhabitants in total immigrated within the Republic of Serbia, where 45 599 inhabitants of them immigrated to another region in Serbia and 47 801 of them immigrated to another settlement, within the same region.
In Serbia, the official language is Serbian. Two alphabets are in use at the same time, Cyrillic and Latin, with the primacy in use of the Cyrillic alphabet. Minority languages are in equal official use at the national and provincial level if the population that speaks a language numbers more than 2% and at the level of the municipality if the participation of a group is 15% according to the last Census. In Vojvodina, which is the most diverse in terms of ethnicity, Hungarian, Slovak, Rusyn, Romanian and Croatian are in official use at the provincial level. In addition, Czech and Macedonian are in use at the municipal level. In several municipalities, as many as five languages are in official use. In the municipalities in the south of the country, Albanian is in use , as well as Bulgarian in the southeastern part. In all municipalities where a minority language is in official use, there is a possibility of organising classes at all levels of education (primary, secondary and tertiary) in their native language. At least 15 students enroled in the first grade of a certain level of education is a required condition for organising such classes (although exceptions are possible).
According to declaration regarding mother tongue, 88.1% of the population declared it was Serbian, 3.4% Hungarian, 1.9% Bosnian, 1.4% Roma, 0.7% Slovakian and around 5% of them listed other languages.
Map of confessions has been changing historically in accordance with changing the boundaries of the country. During the Middle Ages, Eastern Orthodoxy of the Serbian Orthodox Church was the dominant confession in the area southern of the Danube river to Greece. With the expansion of the Ottoman Empire, the Islamic population settles (especially in cities) while a part of local population accepts Islam. However, in this period, the dominant confession is Orthodoxy. The most significant ethnic change and the change in the map of confessions occurred during the 17th and 18th century after the Great Turkish War and the Austro-Russian-Turkish War which caused significant migrations of Serbian Orthodox population. This changed the ratio of the Orthodox people in the south of the country (in favor of Islamic confession) while the newly arrived residents in the territory of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy became significant ethnic and confessional group. With gaining the autonomy and then the establishment of the independent state of Serbia at the beginning of the nineteenth century, Serbia spent one period as ethnically and confessionally homogeneous in order to (after the First World War) become a part of the state union of South Slavs characterised by ethnic and confessional diversity. After World War II and the Communist revolution, religious freedoms were reduced (in terms of freedom of religion practicing, primarily in public places), but not abolished. Confessional affiliation was an important element of ethnic identification and distance in the process of the disintegration of Yugoslavia between people who spoke the same (similar) language and had similar cultural patterns.
Currently, according to the Census in Serbia, in regard to religious affiliation, there are 84.6% Orthodox Christians, 5% Catholics, 3.1% Muslims, 1.1% atheists, 1% Protestants, 3.1% do not declare themselves confessionally, and about 2% other confessions.
According to the current Law on Churches and Religious Communities, which came into force in 2006, eight religious communities enjoy the legal status:
The Register of Churches and religious communities included 17 other religious organisations, too: