TBILISI. April 27 (Interfax) - The number of immigrants in Georgia soared by 142.9% year-on-year in 2022, the National Statistics Office of Georgia said on Thursday.
The Office counted the number of immigrants in Georgia at 179,778, including over a third, or 62,304, from Russia, according to the data released on Thursday.
Georgian citizens who returned to their home country ranked second (54,405), followed by citizens of Ukraine (20,716) and citizens of Belarus (13,361).
A total of 125,269 people emigrated from Georgia in 2022, up 25.3% from the previous year. This number includes 5,935 citizens of Russia.
"In the reporting period, 84.3% of immigrants and 86.7% of emigrants were working-age (15 through 64 years old). In 2022, 30.3% of immigrants and 80.5% of emigrants were citizens of Georgia," the Office said.
According to the Office, Georgia had a population of 3,736,400 as of January 1, up 1.3% from the beginning of 2022. It also recorded a negative natural growth (-6,799) and a positive migration balance (54,509) in 2022.