STA, 17 July 2019 - More than 4,300 Slovenian citizens and some 24,100 foreigners immigrated to Slovenia last year, with the total share of Slovenia's population growth attributable to immigrants being the highest since 2008 - there were almost 15,000 more immigrants than emigrants, shows the Statistics Office data released on Wednesday.
Almost 6,600 Slovenians and more than 6,900 foreigners emigrated in 2018.
The share of immigrants increased by 51% last year compared to 2017, while the share of emigrants dropped by 23%.
The population growth attributable to Slovenian immigrants was negative for the 19th consecutive year - Slovenian emigrants exceeded Slovenian immigrants by almost 2,250 persons, while the immigration trend of foreigners remained positive for the 20th consecutive year.
Most foreigners who came to Slovenia (almost 50%) hailed from Bosnia and Herzegovina, followed by citizens from Serbia, Kosovo, North Macedonia and Croatia.
On the other hand, Slovenians returning back to the native country usually migrated from Germany and Austria (24% and 17%, respectively), followed by Switzerland, the UK and Italy.
A quarter of Slovenians who moved out of the country in 2018 went to Austria, with the rest emigrating to Germany, Switzerland and Croatia.
Most foreigners who left Slovenia behind moved to Bosnia and Herzegovina (24%), Germany, Serbia and Croatia.
Slovenia's internal migrations decreased by some 7% in 2018 on the previous year, totalling almost 104,000 changes of residence (some 89,500 Slovenians and around 14,500 foreigners).
Almost half of people moving within the country were aged 20-39 years, with the majority (80%) moving to another municipality.
Foreigners were again more mobile than Slovenians - among the former, one out of ten moved at least once in 2018 on average, while one Slovenian out of 24 changed the place of residence on average.
More details on these figures can be found here
