Caspian Sea 2011
State of the Environment of the Caspian Sea
once a major source of export income through the fish and caviar trade.
cline in migration), followed by Iran with a 10 per cent growth between 1995 and 2006, Azer- baijan with 8 per cent growth between 1999 and 2007 and Russia with 6 per cent between 2000 and 2009 (National Statistics). The western and southern coasts of the Cas- pian Sea are significantly more populated com- pared to the northern and eastern coastal areas, where the population is quite sparse, in part due to more inhospitable climate conditions throughout the year. Of the littoral countries, Iran has the largest coastal population of close to 7 million (Statisti- cal Centre of Iran 2006; UNDP 2009b). Russia and Azerbaijan together total over 7 million within the administrative districts along the Caspian (Na- tional Statistics), followed by less densely popu- lated Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan with less than 1 million each in the Caspian coastal zone (Na- tional Statistics; CISStat; UNDP 2009).
Population The population dynamics of the Caspian littoral states (US Census Bureau 2010) in 1992 – 2007 vary: while the overall population of Kazakhstan and Russia has declined by 7.6 and 4.8 per cent respectively, the population of Azerbaijan grew by 8.2 per cent, of Iran by 16.0 per cent and of Turk- menistan by 19.8 per cent. However, the total Caspian coastal population (including only administrative units contiguous to the Caspian Sea) gradually increased from 1999, and has stabilized at aproximately 15.475 million by 2007 (National Statistics). The population in Turkmenistan’s coastal ar- eas (though relatively low) grew by 42 per cent since 1999. The population in Kazakhstan grew by 13 per cent from 2000 to 2010 (probably due to the development of new oil fields and a de-
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