Fertility Rate in Belarus has Fallen from 1.38 to 1.08 Children Per Woman Per Lifetime to 1.08 over Last Six Years

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 13 – Belarusians have found another way to cast their votes against the Lukashenka dictatorship: they are having far fewer children than at any point in their history. Over the last six years, the fertility rate (the number of children per woman per lifetime) has fallen from 1.38 to 1.08, far below the replacement level of 2.2, according to government statistics.

            The current rate is below all other European countries except Ukraine which is at war and means that all Belarusians, rural as well as urban, now have a rate roughly equal to that in the largest cities of the Russian Federation (thinktanks.pro/publication/2025/10/13/beloruski-rozhayut-menshe-vseh-v-evrope.html).

            And that in turn means that in the absence of massive immigration or some fundamental change, the population of Belarus will continue to plunge, an unspoken but very real commentary on what the people of that country think about their “president” and his political approach.