Ageing of rural populations in Eastern Poland

Abstract A demographic view of the ageing process of a population provides an assessmentof the degree of development of this phenomenon and its dynamics at a given time in a given area, such as an administrative unit, a country or other territory. In this study, the main research aim was to assess the demographic situation of rural areas in Eastern Poland in the context of an ageing population. Changes in both the number of people and the demographic structure of the population living in the region were analysed. The time period of the research covered the years 2008-2020. Statistical data used in the study were derived from the Local Data Bank of Statistics Poland. The assessment of the regional specificity of the processes of demographic changes in rural areas was based on the study of the relationships in the analyzed parameters, with the use of statistical measures defining the range of variability of the examined characteristics. In order to achieve the main aim of the study, a typology of the areas with a disturbed age structure was developed. Four groups of rural areas have been identified (labelled from A to D) which are characterised by varying degrees of advancement of the examined problem in 2020.