Migrantes: five million Italian citizens live abroad
Rome - On 1 January 2017, the number of Italians living abroad and listed in the Registry of Italians Resident Abroad (Aire) reached 4,973,942, or 8.2% of the 60.5 million citizens living in Italy at that time. In one year, the "Aire population" grew by 162,779 units (+3.3%), while its growth in the last three years was 337,000 (+7.2%), and over 632k (+14.6%) in the last five years. In 2006, the Aire registry listed 3.1 million, a difference of 60.1%. These are some of figures featured in the 2017 "Report on Italians in the World" by the Migrantes foundation, presented today in Rome.More than half (54%) of the Italian citizens live in Europe (2,684,325), mostly in the 15 core EU countries (1,984,461, or 39.9%) while 2,010,984 live in the Americas (40.4%), particularly in Latin America (32.5%). Oceania is the next continent (3%), followed by Africa (1.3%) and Asia (1.3%). As for countries, the largest Italian communities are in Argentina (804,260), Germany (723,846) and Switzerland (606,578), while the United Kingdom recorded the strongest growth (+27,602 registrations in the last year). Half the Italians registered at Aire come from the south of the country (50.1%), 34.8% are from the north, and 15.6% from the central regions. As for provinces, Rome is the first; only three of the top fifteen areas are in the north (Milan, Turin and Treviso are ranked sixth, ninth and tenth, respectively). Marital status broadly follows the general trends: unmarried citizens are on the increase (57%), while married citizens are down 1% compared to 2016, (36,5%). 54.3% of the over 4.9 million Italians abroad have actually moved permanently to another country; in other words, almost 2.6 million Italians have registered with Aire as expatriates. The number of Italians born abroad continues to rise: They were 1,818,158 two years ago, 1,888,223 last year, and 1,956,311 in 2017. In 2017, the number of new citizens featured in the Aire list is166,463 (2.1%). New registrations are also on the increase, with over 225 thousands citizens (4.2%) joining Aire within the year in 2017, and 16.6% (over a million) joining within the previous 5 years. Italian women - with Italian passports and voting rights - resident abroad are 2,391,218, or 48.1% of the national total (nearly +79 thousands compared to 2016). As for age groups, the number of under 18s continues to grow, 748,929 (15.1%); 1,109,533 are 18-34 year olds (22.3%); the largest age group (1,163,968) is that of peak working age citizens, the 35-49 year olds (23.4%); less than a million (946.901, 19%) are aged between 50 and 64; and, finally, over a million is over 65 (20.2%).