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People
Ethnographic Information
Ethnic Latvians comprise the majority of Latvia's total population. Ethnic Russians are the most significant minority. Substantial ethnic Byelorussian, ethnic Ukrainian, ethnic Polish, ethnic German, and Jewish (ethno-religious) minorities are also resident. Indeed, Latvians make up close to 60 percent of the country's population at 57.7 percent. Ethnic Russians make up 29.6 percent, while Belarusians are calculated to represent 4.1 percent of the population, Ukrainians make up 2.7 percent, Poles make up 2.5 percent, Lithuanians make up 1.4 percent, and various other groups form the remaining two percent.
While the Latvian language (Lettish) -- one of the oldest in Europe -- is the official language, Lithuanian and Russian are also spoken. During the Soviet era, Russian was the official language. As a consequence, Russian is the second language of a majority of ethnic Latvians today. Ethnic Russians in Latvia often continue to speak Russian as their first language - and Latvian (Lettish) as their second language. The issue of language is a contentious one with nationalist forces working toward the primacy of the Latvian language and ethnic Russians striving for minority rights.
In terms of religious affiliation, most Latvians are Lutheran, Russian Orthodox, or Roman Catholic.
Human Development
According to recent estimates, Latvians have an average life expectancy at birth of 69 years of age (63 years for males, 75 years for females). The infant mortality rate is 14.96 deaths per 1,000 live births. Literacy is essentially universal (100 percent) among the Latvian population age 15 and older. About five percent of GDP is spent in the country on educational expenditures. About 8.1 percent of GDP is spent on health expenditures. Access to sanitation, water, and health care is considered to be generally very good.
One notable measure used to determine a country's quality of life is the Human Development Index (HDI), which has been compiled annually since 1990 by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The HDI is a composite of several indicators, which measure a country's achievements in three main arenas of human development: longevity, knowledge and education, as well as economic standard of living. In a recent ranking of 169 countries, the HDI places Latvia in the high human development category, at 48th place. Although the concept of human development is complicated and cannot be properly captured by values and indices, the HDI, which is calculated and updated annually, offers a wide-ranging assessment of human development in certain countries, not based solely upon traditional economic and financial indicators.
Written by Dr. Denise Youngblood Coleman, Editor in Chief, www.countrywatch.com; see Bibliography for research sources.
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