MIGRATION OF GEORGIAN POPULATION AGAINST THE BACKGROUND OF THE THIRD DEMOGRAPHIC TRANSITION
Authors: Sulaberidze Avtandil 
Published: August 2020

An important role of migration in the world as well as in local predictable changes, with regard to certain countries’ population, indicates to the challenge of migratory processes. In order to explain the causes of migration, with the aim of its optimization and regulation, there were formulated various theories and concepts regarding the migration. From among these concepts, we have employed the neoclassical theory of migration and the theory of migratory transition, as well as the concept of the third demographic transition.
In the process of the formation of Georgian population, migration played, and still does, a significant part in influencing the growth rate of the Georgian population’s size. If natural increase was the main component in terms of the size formation of the Georgian population during 1960-1991, from 1992 up until today, external migration assumed the same role. Since 1992, the low natural increase can no longer compensate for the negative net migration as a consequence of which the Georgian population has decreased by 3723.5 thousand persons by 2019.
On the one hand, since 1992, Georgia has belonged to the list of the countries that are demographically developed and on the verge of depopulation. On the other hand, because of the high intensity of emigration, it is among the donor countries which supply the developed countries with emigrants. Socio-economic analysis of the migratory processes that are associated with Georgian population has showed us that Georgia’s economy is characterized by a high share of labor in comparison to capital and by low market income, whereas the highly-developed countries of Europe are distinguished by the opposite tendency – the low share of labor compared to the capital and higher market income.
This is directly linked to the neoclassical theory of migration, and the mentioned distinction forces Georgian population to emigrate toward the highly-developed foreign countries. Furthermore, decrease of work-force together with its human capital did not cause a significant growth of their income. In spite of the fact that the salary of the Georgian emigrants (especially illegal ones) is small in the highly- developed countries, in comparison to Georgia, European countries offer substantially higher salaries even on the low-qualification jobs than the actual salaries of a worker employed on the high-qualification jobs in Georgia will ever be. This difference is the main reason as to why the emigrants refrain from returning to their homeland.
A sociological survey has confirmed that emigration from Georgia, besides economic factors, is associated with such social-demographic factors of migration as are: receiving education, exile, and the desire to live in better conditions, etc. These factors substantially determine the positive of migration in the receiving highly-developed countries and negative – in Georgia. Therefore, the more distinction there is between the positive and negative factors of migration, the higher the expected emigration to the other countries and the possibility of staying there. According to the current statistical information with regard to the materials of the
2014 population census, the article demonstrates the dynamics and tendency of the migration of the Georgian population since the country gained its independence up until today. It analyzes migrants’ sex-age structure. It has been revealed that the emigration is especially intensive amid the population that is in their reproductive age and is able- bodied. Moreover, it is related to social-economic factors.
The sociological research conducted on students showed us that 42% of them intend to emigrate abroad after they graduate during 2018-2020. Additionally, working is the primary motive for boys as studying is for girls. After receiving education abroad, the half of them intend to return to homeland provided they can find a job with a decent salary in Georgia.
Net migration has decreased at the expense of the immigration of foreign citizens and not at the cost of illegal Georgian citizens. In the aftermath of a short-term visa- liberalization within the territory of the EU, emigration from Georgia has increased, which is confirmed by the growth of the negative net migration from 2212 to 10763 inhabitants in 2017-2018. This, in turn, will reduce the population reproduction potential in Georgia and through “brain drain” the country will lose its human capital that possesses higher education.
Therefore, it is still early to draw conclusions with regard to improving the perspectives of emigration and immigration of Georgian population.