Dynamics of demographic development of rural areas of Malopolskie voivodship

Małopolskie voivodship (according to the National Census, 31.03.2011) was inhabited by 3337,5 thousand people. This fact settled the voivodship on the fourth position in the ranking with respect to the size of the population after Mazowieckie, Śląskie and Wielkoposkie voivodship. At the same time one can notice that this population constitutes 8,7% of the total number of people in the country. In the cities of Małopolska there were 1641 thousand people (7% of city population in Poland and the fifth position after Śląskie, Mazowieckie, Dolnośląskie and Wielkopolskie voivodships). Rural areas were inhabited by 1696,5 thousand people, which constituted 11,2% of the total population of rural areas in Poland. This placed the voivodship on second position after Mazowieckie voivodship in the ranking with respect to the size of rural population. Since last National Census (2002) Małopolska population has increased by 105,1 thousand people, that is 3.3%. It was the second – after Pomorskie voivodship (4,4%) rate of increase of the number of people. Over this period the number of people in the whole country increased only by 0,7% on average. The increase of the number of people concerned both cities and rural areas in Małoopolska. In case of cities the estimated increase was merely 0,9%, but on average the number of people inhabiting cities dropped by 0,9%.The increase of number of people in case of rural areas was much more significant – it reached the level of 5,7% (3,3% in the whole country). The number of people in rural areas increased systematically generally due to high migration from cities and positive natural growth. According to M. Małopolskie voivodship has a very large number of small farms. On the other hand, the number of people living from farming has been constantly decreasing, which is parallel to processes taking place in the whole country. [Bogusz, Paluch 2011].