Demographics of Paraguay

Paraguay's population is distributed unevenly through the country. The vast majority of the people live in the eastern region, most within 160 kilometres (99 mi) ofAsunción, the capital and largest city, which borders onArgentinato the south and west. TheGran Chacoin the north-west, which accounts for about 60% of Paraguayan territory, is home to less than 4% of the population.
Ethnically, culturally, and socially, Paraguay has one of the most homogeneous populations inSouth America. About 75% of the people aremestizo(mixed Spanish andGuaraníNative American descent), 20% are Whites, and the rest are small minorities of Indigenous or Afro Paraguayan origin.Little trace is left of the original Guaraní culture except the language, which is spoken by 90% of the population. About 75% of all Paraguayans also speak Spanish. Guaraní and Spanish are official languages.
Paraguay has a history of foreign settlement, especially in the 20th century:Germans(the majority areMennonites) with long-time Paraguayan dictatorAlfredo Stroessner(President, 1954–1989) himself of German ancestry;Italians(around 40% of the total Paraguayan population is of full or partial Italian descent);Japanese withOkinawans;Koreans; Chinese;Arabs,Ukrainians;Poles; Southern Europeans;Jews; Brazilians; andArgentinesare among those who have settled in Paraguay. There are also an estimated 234,000Afro-Paraguayans, or 4% of the population.
European and Middle Eastern immigrants began making their way to Paraguay in the decades following theParaguayan Warof 1864–1870 (from 1870 onward). Only 28,000 men and 200,000 women had survived the war, the reason why Paraguay had since then a high rate of illegitimate births. The government pursued a pro-immigration policy in an effort to increase population. Government records indicated that approximately 12,000 immigrants entered the port of Asunción between 1882 and 1907, of whom almost 9,000 came from Italy, Germany, France, and Spain. Migrants also arrived from neighboring Spanish American countries, especiallyArgentina. The immigrant ethnic groups kept their cultures and languages to some extent, especially Brazilians – known as "Brasiguayos".
Official records gave an imprecise sense of the number of Brazilians who came to the country. According to the 1982 census, 99,000 Brazilians resided in Paraguay. Mostanalysts discounted this figure, however, and contended that between 300,000 and 350,000 Brazilians lived in the eastern border region.
Analysts also rejected government figures on the number of immigrants fromSouth Korea, Hong Kong andTaiwan. The 1982 census reported that there were 2,700 Koreans in Paraguay, along with another 1,100 non-Japanese or non-Korean Asian immigrants. Virtually all Koreans and Chinese lived inCiudad del EsteorAsunciónand played a major role in the importation and sale of electronic goods manufactured in Asia.
Paraguay became the site of radical and progressive colonies inspired by political thinkers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. A group of radical socialistAustraliansin the 1890s voluntarily went to create a failed master-planned community, known asNueva (New) Australia(1893 -1897); andElisabeth Nietzsche, a German racial ideologist and sister of philosopherFriedrich Nietzschecame to Paraguay in her attempt to build a colony,Nueva Germania(Neues Deutschland)(founded 1886) devoted to a hypothetical purewhite"Nordic"society.
A 2022 census found that Paraguay's population shrank as a production of migration and having smaller families, as well as better data integrity, resulting in a loss of over one million.
According to the 2022 revision of the World Population Prospectsthe total population was 6,703,799 in 2021, compared to only 1,473,000 in 1950. The proportion of children below the age of 15 in 2010 was 33.5%, 61.4% was between 15 and 65 years of age, while 5.1% was 65 years or older
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Registration of vital events inParaguayare not complete. The Population Department of the United Nations prepared the following estimates.
Note that the numbers of births and deaths below are considered incomplete by the UN and by year of registration rather than by year of occurrence.
(ca) = 2022 census adjusted population.
Total Fertility Rate (Wanted Fertility Rate):