According to Eurostat data, Portugal is the EU country with the second highest average age of the population, only below Italy. The country with the lowest average age is Cyprus.
The average age of the population in Portugal in 2022 was 46.8 years old, the second highest among the 27 member states of the European Union (EU), and the one that has risen the most in the last 10 years, Eurostat data show.
According to data published Wednesday by the EU’s official statistics office on the European population, the average age of EU residents reached, on January 1, 2022, 44.4 years (compared to 44.1 in 2021), having increased 2.5 years compared to 2012, when it was 41.9 years. In Portugal, it rose almost five years.
Eurostat notes that among the 27 member states, the average age ranges from 38.3 years in Cyprus to 48.0 years in Italy, with Portugal being the country with the second highest average (46.8), followed by Greece (46.1).
Compared to 2012, Portugal recorded the largest increase in the average age, up +4.7 years, as it rose from 42.1 to 46.8 years, followed by Spain (+4.3 years) and Greece and Slovakia (both +4.1 years).
Eurostat points out that the average age in the EU rose between 2012 and 2022 in all member states except Sweden, where there was a slight decline, from 40.8 to 40.7 years.
The European statistical office also points out that in addition to the increase in the average age, the EU old-age dependency ratio, defined as the ratio of the number of older people (aged 65 and over) to the number of working-age people (aged 15-64), has also increased by 2022, to 33%, up from 32.5 a year earlier and 27.1% in 2012.
Portugal has the third highest old-age dependency ratio, at 37.2%, surpassed only by Italy (37.5%) and Finland (37.4%), while the lowest were recorded in Luxembourg (21.3%), Ireland (23.1%) and Cyprus (24.5%).
