Demographic crisis and religious denominations in Russia

Although Rosstat has decided to keep the data secret until 2025, many independent demographers believe that the decline in the Russian population is accelerating. The only areas bucking the trend are the Muslim-majority regions of the North Caucasus. Where religious practice is already much more intense than among the faithful of the Orthodox Churches.

Moscow (AsiaNews) - Despite the optimistic views of Kremlin propaganda, reiterated in particularly enthusiastic forms at the start of the new year, Russia's future appears highly uncertain, especially given the increasingly depressing demographic statistics.

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow assures that the country ‘is laying the foundations for a new civilisation, where science, technology, new technologies, high standards of living, education, art and culture are combined with sincere and profound faith’, but the Russian Academy of National Economy warns of the risk of the disappearance of 130 towns with a current population of between 5,000 and 10,000 inhabitants. This could also lead to a significant transformation in Russia's ethnic and religious makeup.

According to the 2010 census, Russia had a population of 142,905,200, while in January 2025, the Rosstat institute counted 146,119,928, but the increase of just over 3 million was due to the population of Crimea and other partially occupied and formally “annexed” regions in the conflict territories in Ukraine.

In reality, the actual population decline over the last fifteen years amounts to 4.4 million fewer citizens, and the rate of this decline is such that Rosstat has decided to keep the data secret throughout 2025 to avoid causing alarm.

However, many independent demographers question the few official data available; one of the best known, Aleksey Rakša, believes that the current population of the Russian Federation, including Crimea and Donbass, does not exceed 143 million people, and therefore without the “new territories” Russia today struggles to reach 140 million, and at this rate by 2100 it could halve to 70 million, but not exceed 120 million.

Moreover, even the official forecasts are not comforting, considering that at least until 2030 the number of inhabitants will continue to decline, and in twenty years' time the population would not exceed 130 million, hoping for the success of propaganda campaigns for “youth fertility” and without looking at the losses due to war and various conflicts.

The Atlantic Council in Washington has published an article by Charlie Walker, a historian at Georgetown University, who poses a dramatic question: “Will Russia be left without Russians?”, calculating that of the 142 million people in 2010, between 74 and 112 million were of Russian ethnicity.

The fact is that the only regions among the 100 federal subjects where there is even minimal population growth are the Muslim-majority regions of the North Caucasus. Added to these are immigrants, mainly from Central Asia, who are also predominantly Muslim.

Despite all the restrictions of recent years, around 200,000 people receive Russian citizenship each year, compared to 1 million fewer Orthodox Russians in the demographic total. “Traditional family values” and a natural tendency to reproduce are in fact increasingly characteristic of Muslims, Russian citizens of non-Russian ethnicity.

According to the Religious Administration of Muslims of Russia, there are currently just over 20 million Muslims living in Russia, a figure that is expected to exceed 30 million by 2050, not counting Central Asian migrant workers, while the number of Russians is expected to fall to 80 million by that year.

If these trends continue, by 2075 the number of more or less Orthodox Russians would be almost equal to that of ethnic groups who are much more committed to Islam, and Russia could legitimately be called a Muslim country.

Official sociologists today speak of 70% of the entire population declaring themselves to be Orthodox Christians, but attendance at religious services does not exceed 3%, while Muslims are much more observant in their official prayers, so in some ways, in terms of religious practice, Russia is already more Islamic than Christian.

The post-Soviet “religious revival”, despite the construction and reopening of many Orthodox churches, which Patriarch Kirill constantly boasts about, has not seen an increase in the number of practising believers for many years, especially since Putin's accession to the presidential throne, i.e. since the millennium.

If anything, occult practices are on the rise, but they are certainly no match for the ardent profession of the Islamic faith, where at the last Kurban-Bayram festival more than half a million faithful gathered in the two capitals of Moscow and St Petersburg, compared to 200,000 Orthodox Christians for Easter.