According to data published by INSEE this Thursday, December 19 on French demography between 2016 and 2022, the population of the southern region is increasing mainly by the many people who come to settle there, and not by its birth rate.
A big boom in the South-West. Between 2016 and 2022, the Occitanie region experienced the strongest demographic growth in mainland France, reveals the annual INSEE study published this Thursday, December 19. Its success is partly due to the attractiveness of Montpellier, but also of Toulouse, which should soon rise to the rank of 3rd French city.
After gaining 5,000 inhabitants per year between 2016 and 2022, Toulouse had 511,684 intramural inhabitants at the end of the count. If this trend continues, the city of Haute-Garonne could soon take 3rd place among the largest French cities from Lyon, which had only 9,090 more inhabitants. Marseille (877,215) and especially Paris (2,113,705) remain far ahead.
With just over six million inhabitants (6,080,731), Occitanie, the fourth most populous French region, is close behind Nouvelle-Aquitaine (6,113,384 inhabitants) and could also overtake it, driven by a growth rate higher annual rate over the period 2016-2022: 0.77% compared to 0.49%. If third place is playable, second and first are firmly occupied by Ile-de-France which has nearly 12.4 million inhabitants and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, inhabited by nearly 8.2 million people.
Occitan demographic growth is notably due to the attractiveness of these two key cities: Toulouse (+ 1.2% per year) and Montpellier (+ 1.5%). The growth of the 4th and 7th largest cities in France during this period far exceeds that of the other metropolises in the top 10.
A more populated region thanks to net migration
According to INSEE, Occitanie’s demographic dynamics are almost entirely due to its net migration – the people who come to settle there, compared to those who leave the region. Its natural balance, that is to say the difference between births and deaths, the region is close to zero.
The annual census method is usually “based on five-year collection cycles», explains INSEE, but the Covid-19 pandemic led to the survey planned for 2021 being postponed by one year, which is why the data revealed on Thursday cover six years from 2016 to 2022. The figures concerning the population to January 1, 2023 will be known at the end of 2025, and so on.
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