Over the past 25 years, the population of the Balearics has grown by 386,138. 80% of this growth has been due to immigration from other countries, as opposed to immigration from other regions of Spain. At the start of this year, the National Statistics Institute estimated the foreign population of the islands to be 352,221, the total population having been 1,244,394.
Twenty-five years ago, Germany, the UK and France were the three countries that supplied most immigrants, followed by Morocco, Argentina, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Belgium and Cuba. Germany and the UK still rank fourth and fifth - 21,381 and 18,722 residents respectively - the shift in immigrant profile having been predominantly Latin American and Moroccan.
The largest immigrant community in the Balearics is now Colombian - 37,017 residents, compared with 1,039 in 2000. Argentina has moved up to second place with 35,600; there were 4,568 Argentines in 2000. The Moroccan population is currently 32,546, whereas it was 6,251 twenty-five years ago.
Average annual population growth of over 15,000 since the start of the century implies annual demand for some 5,000 homes per annum. Emeritus professor of human geography at the University of the Balearic Islands, Pere Salvà, says this demand has contributed to the rising prices for homes and to overcrowding in apartments, while the changing profile has been altering the islands' sociocultural reality.
As to strains on housing, the president of the ABINI association of national and international estate agencies, Daniel Arenas, said at the weekend: "Right now we lack up to 30,000 homes on the islands. According to the National Statistics Institute, the population will increase by some 230,000 over the next fifteen years." And he asked: "Where are we going to grow?"
In recent years, Balearic politicians from both right and left have been highlighting what they consider to be the overpopulation of the islands, with all the implications this has not just for housing but also for services and infrastructure.
8 comments
To be able to write a comment, you have to be registered and logged in
JawsExactly, that sums it up. Going deeper into the figures the Latin Americans can be viewed as coming home to the old country. Speaking the same language, practising the same religion, being totally aware of and at home with the culture they are coming into. Similar to Aussies, Kiwis or Canadians coming to live in the UK. True they still take up services and accommodation but they integrate far more easily than the third group. North Africans ( Moroccan,Algerian,Tunisian) are a completely different situation. Experience to date, both here and in most of Europe show they generally do not integrate, live in their own colonies, and as their numbers increase they press for more accommodation of their religion and customs which does not go down well with the local populations. These are the facts and are not changing. Putting it bluntly, moslems would be far better off living in moslem countries . But they leave because they think they can have a better life here, even though they are not prepared to make changes in their own lifestyle. That is the conundrum .
Morgan WilliamsIt always amuses me that a lot of English people in Mallorca complain non stop about immigrants. Irony!
Bloody foreigners. So many non-Brits here. You'd think it was a foreign country!
I imagine these immigrants are also competing at the bottom of the market against the most vulnerable Mallorcans. I doubt they are bidding on half-million €++ properties in Calvia or Sóller. But shut down wealthy foreign buyers (as opposed to building social housing) and stop tourism, and watch these immigrants compete with the locals for the diminishing number of minimum wage service jobs.
Same here in Edinburgh. They say we have a housing crisis, we don't, we have a 3rd world immigration crisis.
The statistics say that it is ok to rock up and start squatting and you will become 1 of the 100,000 Latin American and Moroccan immigrants that will be allowed to stay regardless of the housing situation.
The Statistic´s are spot on and a lot of people have been saying this for a very long time I have to say I don´t understand how these people come to Europe and just decide to stay and now our situation is your problem , what I do understand is that these people will vote PSOE and that is Sanchez thinking ! and has been also stated is that these people have caused the OVERCROWDING and Demand on Social Services to Dramatically increase .
So what the statistics say is that a migrant population increase from outside of the EU has contributed to a housing crisis ? Food for thought on a national level with Sanchez importing 1.5 million Africans over the next three years, who i assume wont meet the financial conditions ( proof of living funds, medical insurance, work contract etc) put onto EU migrants. Let no one from the government complain again about lack of housing before they meet the current needs.