Demograpfic problems of the Ukrainian countryside in the 1980 s – 90 s. (on the example of the Ukrainian Carpathian regions)

Abstract

The purpose of the publication is to characterize the dynamics of demographic processes in Ukraine (on the
example of the regions of the Ukrainian Carpathians) in the period of the 1980s - 90s; the influence of socio-economic factors on them and outline the origins of the current demographic crisis in Ukraine.
Conclusions. The article examines the main demographic problems of the Ukrainian countryside in the 1980s and 1990s
on the example of Zakarpattia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv, and Chernivtsi regions. Among them, attention is paid to the issue of
depopulation of the rural population, which has covered the entire territory of Ukraine since 1979. It is noted that for a long
time, the territories of the Carpathian region were considered relatively prosperous in terms of demographics, where the
natural increase in population was an average of 7.4 persons per 1,000 population, while in Ukraine this indicator was only
3.5.
The article considers another problem of Ukrainian villages - the aging of the population. By the end of the 1980s, in
almost half of the regions of Ukraine, the share of elderly peasants approached a third. It was noted that the number of people
unable to work also increased during the analyzed period. Thus, if in 1990 there were on average 1,026 people unable to work
for every 1,000 people of working age, then in 1997 this ratio was 1,037 per 1,000 people able to work. The migration of the
most able-bodied category of peasants to the cities also increased. Characteristic for the regions of the Ukrainian Carpathians
was the process of women moving to the cities, mostly of childbearing age, which undermined the demographic basis of the
reproduction of the rural population and became one of the reasons for the social decline of the village.
Conclusions. The researcher concluded that with the deepening of the crisis phenomena in the economy, the situation
of the village worsened - the demographic crisis worsened, unemployment increased, the incomes of the villagers steadily
decreased, and the social sphere was in a neglected state. It was noted that all the above-mentioned problems «got» independent Ukraine as a legacy from «Soviet times» and it was not possible to solve them in the last 30 years.