The number of representatives of indigenous ethnic minorities grew in Ural Federal Okrug

Boris Kirillov, the deputy plenipotentiary envoy of the President of the Russian Federation in Ural Federal Okrug, held the sitting of the Council for indigenous peoples of the North and Siberia. The video conference was attended by the deputy head of the Federal Agency for affairs of nationalities Anna Kotova, the president of the Russian Association of indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East, a deputy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation Grigory Ledkov, representatives of regions included to Ural Federal Okrug. The participants discussed tasks of stabilization and improvement of the demographic situation among indigenous peoples of the North and Siberia.

According to Boris Kirillov, the state pays great attention to demographic issues, and the national project “Demography” is aimed at improvement of the situation.

“The project concerns all citizens of the country, but it is of particular significance for indigenous peoples of the North and Siberia. For them people-saving is a matter of self-preservation, continued existence as part of the multinational Russian nation”, the deputy plenipotentiary envoy said.  

He marked positive achievements of the regions included to Ural Federal Okrug in this direction. Thus, the certain increase in the number of representatives of indigenous peoples has been achieved. If in 2010 the region had about 73 thousand representatives of indigenous ethnic minorities, by 2019 this figure increased by 8% and made about 79 thousand people. At the same time, the total population of Ural Federal Okrug increased by only 2.2% over the same period. Among the positive trends Boris Kirillov also marked indicators for decrease in the overall mortality rate of indigenous population and decrease in the infant mortality rate.  

“Here I would like to highlight Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, where the mortality rate of children under one year old 2.5 times decreased in nine years”, said Boris Kirillov.

Among the positive trends he also marked that the proportion of young people among representatives of indigenous peoples became quite high. This indicator for separate regions of Ural Federal Okrug ranges from 36% to 55%, what is significantly higher than for population in general. The results were achieved largely due to improvement of quality of medical care for indigenous ethnic minorities.  

Boris Kirillov also mentioned a number of problems that should be solved in Ural Federal Okrug. In particular, there is still the high mortality rate among indigenous population from external causes, and also it is not possible to achieve full coverage of representatives of indigenous population with preventive medical examination. 

According to the deputy plenipotentiary envoy, not all problems can be solved only by the regions, some of the issues relate to the federal level. Legal formalization of the mechanism of ethnic identification is the most significant of them. The draft law, owing to which the register of citizens belonging to indigenous ethnic minorities will be created, was adopted by the State Duma of the Russian Federation in the third reading.