Population

Population growth through immigration

In the past three years, population growth in the Netherlands has mainly been due to immigration. Between 1 January 2015 and 1 January 2018, the number of people living in the Netherlands increased by 280,000, and about three-quarters of this population growth came about through international migration. In recent years, refugees have primarily arrived from Syria and, to a lesser degree, from Iraq, Eritrea, Iran and Afghanistan. This asylum-related migration peaked in 2016. More than 20 percent of immigrants from these countries were family members being reunited with people already in the Netherlands.

Immigration from Poland, Romania, Bulgaria and some other Eastern European countries increased significantly after these countries joined the European Union between 2004 and 2007. The abolition of the work permit requirement for Bulgarians and Romanians in 2014 was linked to a fresh influx of Bulgarian and Romanian immigrants. The number of people migrating to the Netherlands from new EU member states has also increased in the last two years.

Eritreans are often single; Turks and Moroccans often live as a couple

Household composition varies significantly between origin groups. In more than three-quarters of cases, people with an Eritrean background form single-person households. Fewer than half the households among other refugee groups such as Syrians, Iranians, Afghans and Iraqis are made up of a single person. The majority of Turkish and Moroccan households consist of a couple, whether with or without children. One in eight of these couples includes at least one partner with a migration background ; this is slightly more likely to be the case among Moroccans than among Turks.
Almost half of couples with a Surinamese background include a partner with a native Dutch background; this fraction is almost two-thirds among couples with an Antillean background. These two groups also include more single people and single-parent families than are present among households formed by people with a Turkish or Moroccan background. Romanians, Poles and especially Bulgarians are also relatively likely to form single-occupier households. When they do form a couple, they fairly often have a partner with a native Dutch background. This is especially true for Romanians, more than half of whom have a Dutch partner.

Migrants overrepresented in large cities

On 1 January 2018, 23 percent of the population of the Netherlands had a migration background; that percentage was higher in large cities. Just over half the residents of Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague have a migration background; the fraction in Utrecht is a third. Almere, Amstelveen, Diemen, Schiedam, Vaals and Capelle aan den IJssel have a higher proportion of residents with a migration background than does Utrecht. Rotterdam has the largest percentage of residents with a non-Western background (38 percent), followed by Amsterdam and The Hague (35 percent). A relatively high number of people with a Western migration background live in these last two cities.

Of all the residents of the Netherlands who have a Surinamese or Moroccan background, just under half live in one of the four largest cities; the same figure for Turks and people from the Antilles is a little over a third. For comparison: nine percent of people with a native Dutch background live in one of these cities. It is especially noticeable among people from Suriname and the Antilles that the second generation is less likely than the previous generation to live in the large cities. Second-generation Turks and Moroccans are also a little less likely than their parents to live in the large cities, but the difference between the generations is smaller in these groups.