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Current topic: Russian urbanization and urban housing

• Urbanization is not only the dynamics of the urban population

• Russian urbanization does not fit into classic schemes

• The infrastructural “inadequacy” of housing and the lifestyle of city-dwellers

• Housing construction and providing adequate “meters”

• The “pulsation” of the population and seasonal housing

• Conclusion

• Links to related topics

• Topics of previous issues

World demographic barometer

World urbanization assessment 2014

• According to UN estimates, in 2014 the proportion of the world's population living in urban areas rose to 54%

• In 1950 30% of the world population lived in urban areas, by 2050 it may exceed 66%

• The number of mega-cities of 10 million or more has increased from 2 in 1950 to 28 in 2014, and by 2030 could rise to 37

• Most of the large and mega-cities are located in the global “South”

Through the eyes of the analysts

• The migration attractiveness of cities as an indicator of the post-Soviet transformation of urban space in Russia

• Distinctive features of the multi-stage development of the Moscow agglomeration

• RBK Study: Why Russian cities are dying out

• A city cut off from the land, people tied to the city: polar Igarka

• The population of Pacific Russia: a clear goal and free enterprise

Q&A

• Participation in the census: a right or an obligation?

• Children: their rights, the admissibility of parental and state control

• The “invisible minority”: on the problem of homophobia in Russia

• If I were a sultan, or polygamy in Russia and the Caucasus

• The first experience of smoking and drinking alcohol

• Priorities of state budget expenditures

In the vastness of Russia

• Life expectancy in Russia reaches record high at 71 years

• Total fertility rate planned for 2018 has already been achieved

• Ministry of Health and the “Health” foundation argue about the causes of increased mortality

• Since 2014 the population of Chechnya has increased by more than 32 thousand people

• In the Far East the population outflow is down by one fourth

• Decline in fertility in Far East is inevitable

• Most Russians believe that the census should be mandatory

• Matvienko proposes to launch a broad discussion of the retirement age in Russia

• Pensions must be indexed in accordance with the law

• Budget deficit of Pension Fund in 2014 came to 31 billion rubles

• Labor ministry proposes to increase minimum wage by 20.7% from January 1, 2016

• In Moscow minimum wage will rise to 16.5 thousand rubles as of June 1

• The number of orphans and children without parental care has shrunk by 72% over 5 years

• Astakhov proposes to penalize parents who leave children unattended

• Mizulina introduces amendments to Family Code in State Duma

• Head of Ministry of Labor proposes to discuss the issue of tax on parasitism

• Matvienko supports the idea of depriving citizens not wanting to work of state support

• The All-Russia People’s Front criticizes initiative to introduce payment for unregistered unemployed persons

• The number of unemployed persons in April decreased by 83 thousand people

• In Moscow City Council the incidence of HIV is reported to be down by 75%, a figure not confirmed by the Department of Health

• Ministry of Health monitoring has found no cases of smoking in 93% of public eating establishments

• Narcotic substances found in the blood of 1.2% of Moscow schoolchildren

• Maternal mortality in Russia has reached a record low

• Infant mortality from congenital malformations in Russia has decreased by 11.5% over four years

• The number of minors who have had abortions has declined by 2.7 times over five years

• State Duma to put bill on the abolition of free abortions up for pubic discussion

• Church favors strengthening of control over private clinics conducting abortions

• Public Chamber supports the idea of creating and distributing “baby boxes”

• Ministry of Health will change vaccination schedule due to high mortality from acute respiratory infections and influenza

• In Federation Council a proposal to punish parents refusing to vaccinate children

• Hospital mortality from myocardial infarction in Moscow has declined by almost 2 times

• In Russia the rabies situation has considerably worsened

• Procedure for providing palliative care for children has been confirmed

• In Novosibirsk a new way has been found of detecting a bacterium infecting two thirds of Russians

• Russians name health as main criteria for quality of life

• 69% of Russians don’t know about health care cuts

• Deputies propose to pay for the sick leave only of participants in health care programs

• Moscow Mandatory Health Insurance policy to be replaced by bank card

Eurasian panorama

• Over a million of Georgia’s citizens live outside the country

• In past 24 years about 1 million ethnic Kazakhs have returned to their historical homeland

• Average Belarusian family living on $610 a month

• UN will continue to seek payment from Kiev of pensions for all residents of Donbass

• Pensions and salaries in Donetsk People’s Republic will be issued partially in US dollars

• Ukrainian pensioners, invalids, Chernobyl victims and “Heaven’s Hundred Heroes” have been stripped of their benefits

• IMF predicts double-digit inflation in Kirgizia and Tajikistan

• In Belarus, unemployment has almost doubled

• Unemployment in Georgia in 2014 lowest in 11 years

• In Tajikistan about 62 thousand jobs created since beginning of the year

• The number of internally displaced persons in Ukraine has increased to 1,316,000 people

• European Union in no hurry to let in Ukrainian refugees

• UN General Assembly adopts yet another resolution on refugees in Georgia

• FMS lifts ban on entry into Russia of 2,215 citizens of Armenia

• Kirgiz President stands up for workers on the Russian blacklist

• The flow of migrant workers from Russia and Belarus to Kazakhstan has increased significantly

• Tajikistan links reduction in labor migration of its citizens to tightening of Russian legislation

• The number of workers from Tajikistan in Russia has decreased by 20%

• Remittances from Kirgiz migrants have fallen by 37% over past four months

• Will joining the EAEC improve the situation with remittances from Russia to Kirgizia?

• World Bank predicts a 40% fall in remittances to Tajikistan

• Bishkek to host international conference “Migration in Central Asia”

• Over 6,400 people have been killed in the conflict in eastern Ukraine

• About four million Ukrainian women have been victims of physical violence

• One third of domestic crimes in Belarus committed by unemployed persons

• Same-sex marriages are supported by 2.2% of the population in Belarus

World news

• 600 million jobs must be created in world by 2030

• Demographic situation in Lithuania is “a huge problem”

• The number of hungry people in the world has fallen below 800 million

• Average salary in Estonia in 2015 was 815 euros

• In the UK, Islam has become the fastest growing religion in terms of numbers of followers

• Muslims should adapt to the laws of France, and not vice versa

• Grybauskaite proposes to radically change Lithuania’s Labor Code

• Bulgaria gains support of Luxemburg on the issue of accession to the Schengen area

• European Commissioner outraged by failure to give Latvian children citizenship

• Interior Ministers of France and Germany call EC proposal on migrants unbalanced

• Proposed EU solution to the problem of refugees is unacceptable for Lithuania

• Estonia shocked by necessity of accepting 1,064 refugees from Africa

• New government of Finland is against quotas for Syrian refugees

• Latvia considers 6 thousand euros per refugee too little

• The Vatican considers quotas for accepting refugees immoral

• Bulgaria has exhausted possibilities for accepting illegal migrants

• Malaysia will not be able to resolve the issue of refugees within the year

• Over a thousand people became victims of violence in Iraq in May

• Number of victims of heat wave in India exceeds 800 people

• Canadian court orders tobacco companies to pay smokers 12 billion dollars

• 11,145 people have died from the Ebola virus since the beginning of the epidemic

• UN Secretary-General urges not to relax efforts to combat spread of Ebola virus

• Bacterial resistance to antibiotics is growing faster than the creation of new medicines

• Mankind faces infection disaster

• Smoking and obesity, paradoxically, reduce the likelihood of death from stroke

• World Health Assembly endorses WHO reform

• Nebraska becomes 19^th US state to abolish death penalty

• World’s first murder took place in Spain 430,000 years ago

The newspapers write about…

• “Nezavisimaya Gazeta” on the demographic situation in Russia

• “Novaya Gazeta” on the causes of increased mortality in Russia in early 2015

• “Novye izvestiya” on murders in Russia

• “Polit.ru” on mortality in the USA

• “Novye izvestiya” on mortality from India’s heat wave

• “Ogonyok” on the socio-demographic problems of Russia

• “Novye izvestiya” on Germany’s low fertility

• “Sverigesradio” on economic incentives for egg donation in Switzerland

• “Ekho Moskvy” and “Ekspress-gazeta online” on the idea of banning abortion

• “Novye izvestiya” on the Government’s attitude to the abolition of free abortions

• “Ogonyok” on the new wave of opposition to abortion

• “Ogonyok” on the “wedding of the century” and “Chechen traditions”

• “Izvestiya” on the attitudes of Russians to polygamy

• “Russkiy reporter” on alcohol consumption in the world

• “Ogonyok” on alcohol consumption and female alcoholism

• “Gazeta.ru” on smoking in the world

• “Slon.ru” and “Kommersant” on the fight against smoking

• “Kazakhstanskaya Pravda” on smoking in Kazakhstan

• “Telegraf” on the population of the Donetsk People’s Republic

• “Chas” on demographic problems of Latvia

• “Paruskg.info” on the population of Kirgizia and migration

• “RBK” on 5 million people with dual citizenship

• “Ekho” on dual citizenship in Azerbaijan

• “Novaya gazeta vo Vladivostoke” on demographic and migration problems of the Far East

• “Ekspert-Kazakhstan” on the consequences of Kirgizia entering the EAEC

• “Slon.ru” on labor migration of minors from Tajikistan

• “Radio Bolgaria” on children of Bulgarian migrants

• “Kommersant-Dengi” on Europe’s immigration problems

• “The New York Times” on Ukrainian refugees in Europe

• “Novaya gazeta” on “boat people”

• “Kommersant” on giving social benefits only to people in need

• “Kommersant” on a registry of persons with disabilities

• “Dengi” on helping the elder generation

• “Kommersant-Dengi” and Novye izvestiya” on Russia’s pension problem

• “Zerkalo nedeli” on the retirement age in Ukraine

• “Kommersant” and “Ekspert” on economic inequality

• “Kommersant” on the economic consequences of small business moving into the shadow

• “Kommersant” on the fight against shadow employment

• “Dengi” on the economic effectiveness of forced labor

• “RBK” on the influence of religion on one’s financial situation

• “Ogonyok” on the crisis, paternalism and happiness

• “Kommersant” on the attitude of Russians to mandatory participation in the census

• “Daily Mail” on anti-racist sleep

Read books and newspapers

• Compatriots and the historic homeland: mutual discourses and practices

• Improving the environment and health in Europe: how far have we gotten?

• Being Young In Europe Today - 2015 Edition

• World Urbanization Report 2014 Revision. Highlights

• Regions of Russia. The main socio-economic indicators of cities. 2014

• Through the pages of the journals “Demographicheskoye obozreniye” (“Demographic Review”) and “Obshestvennye nauki i sovremennost” (“Social Sciences and Modernity”)

• Contents of the “Journal of International Migration and Integration”

Profession: researcher

• Demographic losses of the USSR and Russia in the first half of the 20^th century. Meeting of the Demographic Section of the Central House of Scientists of the RAS

• “Mify i fakty v izuchenii stareniya i prodolzhitelnosti zhizni” (“Myths and Facts in the study of aging and longevity”) Public lecture in HSE

• 65 years since the birth of Nikolai Borisovich Barkalov

The reading room

• N.B. Barkalov. Modeling of demographic transition

Satirical column

• The evil of abortion and goodness with fists