Roving Periscope: Depopulating, Russia urges women to produce 10+ kids
Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: That Russia, the world’s largest country by area with 11 percent landmass of the globe, was underpopulated was well known. In 2022, its population is around 146 million, with an average population density being only nine people per square kilometer, mostly in the western part of the Russian Federation.
Now, a developing demographic disaster, with the Covid-19 pandemic and the war against Ukraine having taken a heavy toll on society, especially males, has worried Moscow to no end. It is, therefore, offering money to young women to produce at least ten children each to make the nation survive.
The demographic crisis has forced Russia, currently facing acute financial and other sanctions from the West and its allies, to revive a Soviet-era “Mother Heroine” scheme to lure women back into pregnancy and get financial rewards.
The development comes after Russia reported its highest number of daily coronavirus cases since March this year. On Wednesday, for example, Russia, the ninth most affected country, registered nearly 36,000 fresh cases, including 62 deaths. So far, Russia has witnessed over 19 million infections, including 384,000 deaths since early 2020 when the pandemic broke out.
After its February 24 invasion of Ukraine, the Russian armed forces reportedly lost around 50,000 soldiers, mostly men, and many civilians.
President Vladimir Putin, worried over demographic imbalance, has taken initiatives to repopulate Russia. These include a one-time incentive/reward payment of 13,500 pounds (968,726 rubles or nearly Rs. 13 lakh) for mothers to produce and keep at least ten children alive, according to the media reports.
According to the media reports, which quoted Dr. Jenny Mathers, Russian politics and security expert, President Putin announced this scheme as a measure to replenish a dwindling population.
To encourage women to pregnancy, President Putin has been praising the people with large families as “more patriotic.”
Under the repopulation scheme, women will get a one-off payment of 1 million roubles after their tenth child reaches its first birthday, on the condition that the other nine are all still alive.
Dr. Mathers said, “It is pretty desperate. I mean, Russia has had difficulties with demographics, trying to get enough people to populate the country really since the 1990s off and on.”
He said the Covid-19 pandemic had really set Russia’s demographics back significantly besides the war in Ukraine.
“So, this is obviously an attempt to encourage Russian women, or inspire them, to have more babies and to have really big families,” he said.
“But who can imagine raising ten children for £13,500? Where are they all going to live in the meantime? There are many economic, social, and political problems in Russia,” he said.
