Messina continues to depopulate: in five and a half years, from 2019, there are 10 thousand fewer inhabitants. As if Taormina had disappeared, just to make a comparison. But there are also movements in the opposite direction and they are due, above all, to those who arrive from abroad and decide to live on the banks of the Strait, despite the fact that it is here that the highest unemployment rate among the large Italian municipalities is recorded. The photograph of the city that the Municipality’s statistics office has created again this year is full of nuances, all to be read and analysed. The “Messina in figures 2024” report delivers, as often happens, chiaroscuro data.
The first is the demographic one: in Messina, as of 31 December 2024, the population is equal to 221,011 inhabitants, of which 106,248 males and 114,763 females: 1,139 less than in 2023. With an ever decreasing trend, given that as of 20 October the population has fallen further, reaching 220,350 inhabitants. Another 661 fewer in ten months.
But going deeper we discover something that deserves to be highlighted: the decline of this last year is determined above all by the so-called negative natural balance (-1,331 units), while the migratory balance is positive, with 431 more units. What it means: the natural balance is the difference between the number of live births and the number of deaths, essentially in 2024 more people from Messina died than were born.
The full article is available in the print and digital editions
