Balkan depopulation

[TheOne]

There is a silent nightmare taking place in the Balkans, with large-scale emigration plus by a low birth rate. Serbia and Albania have lost over half a million people since 2014, Bosnia and Herzegovina is expected to lose half of its manpower by 2050 (more than during the 1990 wars), and Croatia losing more than one million citizens since 1990.

EU membership brings many benefits, ranging from democratisation, the rule of law, the protection of minorities and the freedom of speech. One thing the low-income countries currently in, or aiming to join, the EU had not anticipated was large-scale migration.

The Balkans has been the epicentre of relentless wars and ethnic cleansing — but there is nothing of greater threat than a continually-shrinking population, fuelled by low birth rates, massive emigration and an increasingly unattractive market for foreign investment.

The reasons for leaving?​

The Balkans has always been a source of emigration, and that is not new, with many at different times fleeing wars, poverty, or simply in pursuit of better opportunities.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Yugoslav leaders even authorised men to migrate to Germany and Austria as 'Gastarbeiter' [foreign workers]. Mass emigration followed quickly upon the collapse of communism in Albania. For relatively small countries lacking natural resources, migration was often viewed as the best option to relieve the burden of overpopulation.

What has made the current situation a time-bomb is a vastly lower birth rate and absence of a policy by the government to tackle the issue.

The region has never caught up with a real market economy. Most of the politicians have geared up their economy to enrich themselves or their friends' circle, leaving limited and few chances for the people.

Whilst corruption and nepotism has been a prevailing factor in awarding government jobs, low salaries in many privately-run enterprises was a crucial element in making them unattractive to local or foreign immigrants.

Because of the small size of these countries, they are unable to draw sufficient foreign investments or large companies that can offer a well-paid salary. Despite the fact all the national governments recognise the problem, they have hardly taken any action. Aside from some restraints on healthcare workers, other professions are hard to restrain — and even for healthcare it's only a postponement.

To complicate the situation, virtually everybody can easily travel from the Balkan countries to richer countries such as Austria, Italy, Germany or the Benelux countries.

Equipped with fairly good language knowledge, finding a job and relocating to another country offering better pay or greater opportunities is easy. On the other hand, the Balkans countries are not able to bring enough foreign labour to compensate for those who left, in contrast for example to Poland, which attracted 1.3-1.5 million Ukrainians (before the 2022 war started) as workers in different sectors.

The mass emigration of young, well-educated people deprives the home country of labour, in addition to the problem of the ageing population and sufficient funds to maintain the pension system.

IT, tourism, healthcare​

Virtually every sector suffers from emigration, but in particular, these three: since almost every job is related to technology, many of the companies in the region cannot find IT experts.

The salaries offered by Croatian companies are far below what the German companies can offer, apart from social and health security.

Tourism was the second sector to suffer from the mass exodus. Although only at their busiest for three to four months of the year, but crucial for the economic growth of almost all countries in the region, many supermarkets, hotels, restaurants and bars have difficulties finding the necessary staff.

Until recently, it wasn't difficult for hotels located near the coast to recruit Albanians from the smaller towns to work for three to four months or to employ teenagers or students during their summer holidays. In the tourism sector, however, they are now moving to better countries. The primary destination is Croatia, where the tourist season is longer and the salary is higher.

The third sector is healthcare, while some steps have been taken to curb emigration, but these will most probably only postpone the problem but not solve it.

By 2023, it was reported than 3,500 doctors and nurses had left Albania for Germany. This is a nightmare for Albania. An ageing population, which logically requires more medical care compared to younger people, a large-scale emigration of doctors and fewer young people studying medicine, will inevitably increase the hospital waiting lists.

While Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia lost population after joining the EU, Moldova, Albania and North Macedonia have already lost population before joining the EU.

Can the governments tackle the problem with higher pay, improved healthcare or better services? Why are young people migrating? Can the government do anything to stop them?

Those are some of the most difficult questions to answer. People migrate for a variety of reasons, and pay is certainly one of them, plus the much higher standard of living in western Europe.

Most people leave to settle in a non-corrupt society with improved health and welfare, a rule-based society, without nepotism or corruption. As young people tend to travel more extensively and have the skills required, they often see more opportunities for both themselves and their families in a democratic society. This migration therefore relates a lot to financial and monetary aspects, but also to the hope of a better and more secure future.

For the regional governments, the path forward is to switch from a combination of a stabilitocracy and authoritarian policies to a democratically-organised society.

 

[TheOne]

The Ticking Trash Time Bomb In The Balkans​

Every time Srdjan Milic steps into his backyard, his nose rudely reminds him that he lives near one of Kosovo's biggest and most toxic waste dumps.

"I don't know how to put it: We live here because we have to live here. You can smell it yourself," Milic, 72, told RFE/RL's Kosovo Service.

Milic's modest home is located in Palaj, a settlement near Obiliq, a town in central Kosovo, an area of the tiny Balkan country that is already struggling with choking pollution from coal-powered energy plants.

In recent years, the nearby Mirash landfill, about 500 meters from Milic's home, has become not only an increasing worry for residents but also for the authorities and even the EU, which has called on Pristina to clean up the site and shut it down, with Brussels even suggesting it could fund an alternative.

Landfills bursting at the seams are common across the Balkans. Kosovo, Albania, and Montenegro were recently ranked by London's Lloyd's Register as among the globe's worst 10 countries in handling waste and tackling pollution.

In Albania, for example, beaches on the Adriatic coast are strewn with trash as plans to build incinerators are delayed amid widespread corruption. In Montenegro, although environmentalism is enshrined in the country's constitution, little progress has been made.

The Case Of Kosovo

Created in 2006, the Mirash landfill takes in trash from at least six Kosovar cities, totaling around 160,000 metric tons per year. Situated in a former coal pit, the landfill lies lower than a nearby lake, leaving it susceptible to flooding.

"The problem with sewage at this landfill has been out of control for many years because the collection point has flooded," said Dardan Velija, head of the Public Company for Waste Landfill Management (KMDK).

In its latest report in 2022, the KMDK said the site poses a "permanent risk to the environment, a threat to state assets, but the greatest danger is the potential risk to human health and the loss of life in that environment."

The European Union has repeatedly urged Kosovo to close and clean up the site amid numerous KMDK warnings the landfill could contaminate groundwater in surrounding villages. Despite that, neither the KMDK nor the Kosovar government has presented plans to shut the site.

"As long as there's no new [landfill] capacity, it's practically impossible to close it," Velija added.

Not just Pristina, but Brussels and other European partners are concerned. The German Development Bank told RFE/RL it was exploring alternative landfill sites to "reduce the burden on Mirash."

Mirash is no outlier. Most of the Kosovo's seven other public -- i.e. legal -- landfills should be closed or at least expanded because they are overflowing.

Kosovo Ranks Third Globally For Unsorted Household Waste​

In Kosovo, 84 percent of people don't separate their household waste before disposal -- the third highest share in the world.

Percentage of people who don't separate their household waste
Gabon

88%
Ivory Coast

85%
Kosovo

84%
Togo

83%
Cameroon

80%
Benin

80%
Liberia

79%
Republic of the Congo

79%
Montenegro

78%
Albania

78%
Source: World Risk Poll (Lloyd’s Register Foundation)



Rising Cancer Rates

While Montenegro declared itself an "ecological state" back in 1990 (it became independent in 2006), the country has struggled with that status, in particular with regard to waste management, including landfills.

One of the most notorious landfills, near the town of Rozaje, has been a ticking trash time bomb for decades. Local residents suspect it is behind high lung-cancer rates. Local doctors tend to agree but no data confirms any link.


rferl . org/a/pollution-balkans-kosovo/33210735.html

 

[TheOne]

Srdjan Milic stands in his backyard in Palaj, a settlement near Obiliq, a town in central Kosovo.
"My father died of lung cancer, as did three of my uncles. They all died relatively young, up to the age of 60," said Denis Muric, a local activist. "But [there is] one interesting thing -- they all suffered from lung cancer. They had no genetic history of cancer before."

A local doctor, Adem Muric, is also convinced rising cancer rates are linked to the landfill.

"I worked in Rozaje from 2019 to 2023, and there was a clear increase in cancer cases, particularly among the younger and middle-aged populations," Muric said. "Dozens of people from nearby villages have died from lung cancer."

For decades, waste -- up to 6,500 metric tons a year -- has ended up at the Mostina waste dump. In 2012, local officials announced plans to close it down, but more than a decade later the landfill still operates.

Activists say waste of all types ends up there now, including tires, which are often burned, posing an additional environmental risk.

The government has announced a new regional landfill to be built by 2025, as Podgorica worries failure to resolve this environmental crisis could complicate the country's European future.

"If we do not resolve this issue…Mostina and many other landfills -- unfortunately, there are around 340 of them in Montenegro, including illegal ones -- all of these could become an obstacle to Montenegro's entry into the European Union," said Damjan Culafic, Montenegro's environmental minister.

After public pressure and protests, authorities have increased monitoring of Mostina, and burning waste at the site was largely halted in September.

But local residents continue to press for more action and Muric has filed a lawsuit for officials mismanagement of the landfill.

"When the smoke from the landfill reaches us, it completely fills this place, and we can't see each other because of the smoke," Denis explained.

With EU states hoping to hit recycling rates of at least 50 percent by 2030, Kosovo, Albania, and Montenegro have much work to do to catch up.

 

[TheOne]

AIR POLLUTION AND ITS CONSEQUENCES ON MORTALITY RATES AND THE HEALTH OF WESTERN BALKANS CITIZENS

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Air pollution in the Western Balkans causes 30,000 premature deaths a year, the European Environment Agency estimates. Inhaling polluted air leads to increased mortality, shortened life expectancy and an increase in the number of chronic diseases, while the health costs paid by the citizens of the Western Balkans are rising. Reducing air pollution is a public health measure that would directly increase citizens’ quality of life and health, and indirectly reduce mortality rates.
Poor air quality in the Western Balkans places the region at the top of Europe’s most polluted areas and continues to cause a growing decline of public health. The region’s countries are particularly jeopardized because air pollution combined with a lower level of economic development, poverty and subpar healthcare systems, adds up to create a lethal situation.

Some of the main sources of air pollution in the Western Balkans include the use of coal for energy production, industry emissions, waste combustion, agriculture and construction activities, transport vehicles, and diesel generators. These sources are also the main locations of origin for particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10), ozone, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide and heavy metals, which are globally responsible for millions of premature deaths every year.

The effects of exposure to polluted air vary, from clinical effects such as lower respiratory infections, to premature death and increased mortality rates from stroke, heart disease, chronic pulmonary disease, lung cancer and acute respiratory infections.

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The price of polluted air is paid in human lives​

According to estimates[1] by the European Environment Agency, air pollution in Western Balkan countries has led to a total of 30,000 premature deaths attributable to excessive particulate matter (PM2.5), ozone (O3) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) pollution.

The EU’s Joint Research Centre states that air pollution, on average, contributes between 4% and 19% of the total premature mortality rates, and decreases life expectancy by 0.4-1.3 years in countries of the Western Balkans.

It is estimated that exposure to solid particles (PM2.5) is responsible for 75 percent of all deaths related to exposure to polluted air. The values of permitted emissions of pollutants defined in the guidelines on air quality – in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Kosovo and Serbia are higher than in most EU member states.

Data from the report "Chronic Coal Pollution" show that more than half of premature deaths in 2016 caused by emissions from Western Balkan coal-fired power plants occur in the EU: 2,013 out of 3,906 premature deaths affected the EU population, while 1,239 deaths occurred in the Western Balkans and 654 in other locations. In the Western Balkans, Serbia suffers the most health impacts due to coal pollution from the region – 570 premature deaths.

Air pollution has a bigger effect on shortening the lives of the elderly population and children under the age of five, which is particularly the case in low-income countries.

Persons of a lower socioeconomic status are often more exposed to air pollution since they tend to live in areas of high-intensity traffic and close to pollution sources, such as power plants and industrial facilities. Vulnerability is also caused by subpar housing, lack of healthy food stores and green areas, as well as inadequate access to healthcare. In addition, in most cases poor people work “dirty“ jobs which implies professional exposure to fumes, particulate matter, gases and heavy metals.

Finally, the price of air pollution is reflected by healthcare costs. It is estimated that just coal-fired power plants in the Western Balkans cause economic damages in the form of healthcare expenses ranging from €1.2 to €3.4 billion every year.

​

How can we achieve better public health and cleaner air in the Western Balkans?​

In order to save human lives and preserve public health, we must improve air quality as soon as possible, as well as the state of public health, by advancing healthcare systems.

It is necessary to define the reduction of air pollution as a national, regional and international priority, and integrate it in state and city development planning processes. However, most importantly, these measures must not remain a dead letter, and adequate resources must be provided for their implementation. Therefore, Western Balkan countries would have to increase their national and local budgets for air pollution control and set priorities which aim to reduce the impact of pollutant emissions on the population and the environment.

In order to advance oversight of polluters and improve air quality, multisectoral partnerships need to be established at local, national and regional levels. The prevention of noncommunicable diseases which come as a result of poor air quality should be made an integral part of environmental policy priorities. All of this must be accompanied by measures to address climate change, which increasingly influences almost all aspects of life.

The reduction of mortality rates, prolonging life expectancy and lessening the healthcare costs of breathing polluted air, also requires bottom-up citizens’ action. Namely, the air pollution issue – one that knows no borders between Western Balkans states – can only be resolved in solidarity, at a regional level.



In order to preserve and prolong human lives together, join us in solidarity in the Western Balkan citizens’ struggle and become a part of the “Balkans United for Clean Air” campaign


balkanfund . org/general-news/what-is-polluted-air-doing-to-us-in-the-western-balkans-1

 

[TheOne]

Abandoned space in Serbia has been identified in several regions: 1. belt of Central Serbia along the administrative line towards Kosovo and Metohija, 2. border belt towards Montenegro, 3. southeast of Serbia, 4. southern rim of the Stara Planina mountain [59]. According to the 2011 population census, 225 settlements had less than 20 inhabitants, and 98 villages in Serbia had less than 10 inhabitants [60].
The cadastral municipality with less than 20 inhabitants was chosen as the basic unit for the analysis of several factors of abandonment, because it is a territorial unit that, as a rule, covers the area of one inhabited place. The largest number of cadastral municipalities, which are part of this research, had one settlement. The borders of the cadastral municipality are geometrically defined and geodetically described (coordinates).
We accepted and modified the typology that links the abandonment of villages and changes in land use [61]. The modification was made by introducing the number of inhabitants for a certain type:

Depopulated and Abandoned Areas in Serbia in the 21st Century—From a Local to a National Problem

Depopulated or abandoned spaces are a consequence of the emptying of settlements and the complete disappearance of the human factor in the use of space. The aim of this paper is to determine the size and structure of this space—clusters that can be considered abandoned at the regional level. In...

www.mdpi.com

 

[bigsnake49]

I see internal migration to bigger cities and depopulation of small settlements happening all over Greece. We have not lost as much population as some other Balkan countries because some Albanians and Bulgarians emigrated to Greece and because some Greek Pontics from the Caucasus area also migrated to Greece. But the concentration of population into a few larger cities and the brain drain of professionals are major problems. We are educating the doctors and engineers to benefit the German and Dutch companies.