Experts warn that Armenia’s rapid, increasing and damaging emigration is a natural response to the country’s economic policy. Further, economic development suffers, as prevailingly well-educated people are leaving Armenia and their skills and knowledge contribute to other countries’ progress.

Ethnographer Aghasi Tadevosyan says during the two decades of independence none of the successive authorities has implemented any proper development project, as otherwise they would have understood that human resources are a powerful weapon for economic development.

Professionals in the field say that the “active share” of the emigrating population, which in any society makes 6-7 percent, would have done much more in their homeland than abroad if provided with proper conditions.

Independent demographer Ruben Yeganyan referring to Armenian communities residing in the Middle East says that they might be facing new challenges and will probably migrate form the countries of their current residence, however will not return to Armenia; at best, he says, Armenia might be a transit country, but not a final destination.

Using Iraqi-Armenians’ example the demographer says that some 1,000 Iraqi-Armenian families have settled in Armenia, whereas others preferred to move to other developing and developed countries.

“This is the consequence of what conditions Armenia is offering them. And because Diaspora Armenians have lived (and still do) a better provided life than Armenia-based Armenians, hence Armenia becomes a final refuge for very few of them. Some 360,000 Azerbaijani-Armenians fled to Armenia [after pogroms in Baku and Sumgait], today only 50,000-70,000 of them are still here,” says Yeganyan.

Gagik Yeganyan, heading the emigration service at the Ministry of Territorial Administration, says that if emigration from Armenia had reached such terribly and growingly alarming scale, it would have been reflected in the indexes of passenger stream – the number of arrivals versus departures. However, the passenger indexes for the past three years do not reveal any tangible tendencies.

According to him, in 2008 the number of departing people exceeded the number of arrivals by 23,000; in 2009 the departure-arrival gap grew to 25,000 and reached 29,860 in 2010, totaling to 77,860 people for three years. During the first five months of 2011 the trend remained unchanged.

The majority of Armenia-based Armenians – some 65 percent – leaves for Russia, 5 percent to the Ukraine and Belarus, 10 percent to Europe, and the remaining 10 to other countries.

The ministry’s Yeganyan says that the exact number of people who have left Armenia permanently would be hard to calculate, as the number of returning passengers is not always registered.

“Every emigrant is a passenger but not every passenger is an emigrant, and a special research is needed in order to find out the number of passengers who have left permanently. Mass emigration took place in the first half of 1990s when the gap between departing and arriving people was 120,000-220,000 per year and in the second half of 90s, when it dropped to annual 60,000. There have been years when more people arrived than departed – from 2003 to 2006,” he says.

Speaking about demographic issues in the country, demographer Yeganyan says that until recently the growth in birth rates was conditioned by the fact that the generation born in 1980s reached a reproductive age; however starting last year it’s been going for a decline.

He is convinced that the absolute decrease of birthrate will continue long and steady, and in five year’s time the death rate will exceed birthrate.

“We have long entered a risk zone and time will come when the level of natural reproduction will drop drastically, it already has,” says Yeganyan.

According to his data, there are around 2.8-2.9 million people living in Armenia. The National Statistical Service data for 2010, however, show 3.3 million, but non-officially it is 2.5-2.7 million. The 2011 census results will be ready in February.