Postcard from Bishkek

When I first came to Kyrgyzstan, back in 1995, people often quoted, almost as a mantra, that Kyrgyzstan was a multicultural society with over 80 nationalities represented in the population.  It was so often quoted that it was easy to accept, remembering that the territory of the Kyrgyz Republic spanned the ancient trade route known as the Great Silk Road which travelled between mysterious Orient and Classical Europe.  Then there were the mnigrations of Russian settlers followed by migrations on Dungans and Uighurs fleeing persecution in China and the forced migrations of the Stalinist era of the Soviet Union which saw Ukranians, Tartars, Koreans and other nationalities settling here.

At that time, the Akaev regime even adopted as a slogan the phrase: Kyrgyzstan Nash Obshe Dom – Kyrgyzstan: Our Common Home.

With the events of recent years in mind, (and in particular those in the South of the country earlier this year), when ethnic tensions rose to the fore and some of the ethnic Kyrgyz politicians have adopted the phrase “the titular nation”, the question of the ethnic composition of the country has assumed a growing importance.

It was in the light of this background that my interest was aroused over the weekend, when I came across a newspaper report in response to a reader’s question: Could you publish the details of the population figures for Kyrgyzstan and the city of Bishkek for different nationalities between 1999 and 2009? (Presumably those two years were chosen, because that was when Kyrgyzstan conducted a National Census.)

In answer, the newspaper printed a table taken from a publication of the National Statistics Committee.

Here’s a copy of the table – although I have translated into English, and slightly rearranged it.  Fopr example, I have separated it into two tables: one for Kyrgyzstan and another one for Bishkek, and I have also moved the totals from the first row into the last, but the figures are basically the same:

Kyrgyzstan:

Nationality	1999	2009	1999	2009
			%	%
Kyrgyz	3128147	3864778	64.9%	71.0%
Uzbek	664950	768405	13.8%	14.3%
Russian	603201	419583	12.5%	7.8%
Dungan	51766	58409	1.1%	1.1%
Uighur	46944	48543	1.0%	0.9%
Tajik	42636	46105	0.9%	0.9%
Turkish	33327	39133	0.7%	0.7%
Kazakh	42657	33198	0.9%	0.6%
Tatar	45438	31424	0.9%	0.6%
Ukrainian	50442	21924	1.0%	0.6%
Korean	19784	17299	0.4%	0.3%
Azerbaijani	14014	17267	0.3%	0.3%
Kurds	11620	13171	0.2%	0.3%
German	21471	9487	0.4%	0.2%
Other	46541	34057	1.0%	0.6%
Total	4822938	5362793

Bishkek:

Nationality	1999	2009	1999	2009
			%	%
Kyrgyz	398000	552957	52.2%	66.2%
Uzbek	12393	11801	1.6%	1.4%
Russian	252831	192080	33.2%	23.0%
Dungan	3558	4040	2.1%	2.2%
Uighur	13143	13800	1.7%	1.6%
Tajik	1828	917	0.2%	0.1%
Turkish	2277	3149	0.3%	0.6%
Kazakh	12064	9013	1.6%	1.1%
Tatar	15817	12712	2.1%	1.5%
Ukrainian	16125	7987	2.1%	1.0%
Korean	12700	12014	1.7%	1.4%
Azerbaijani	2454	2142	0.3%	0.3%
Kurds	0	0	0.0%	0.0%
German	5228	2554	0.7%	0.3%
Other	13800	11097	1.8%	1.2%
Total	762308	835743

You’ll also notice that I have coloured some of the figures red.  There’s a good reason for that – they are wrong, (or at least they are inconsistent with the rest of the data in the table).

The trouble is that the statistician in me asked some questions.

The first was … there are only 14 nationalities listed – what happened to the other 66?  The answer to that is probably quite simple – the last category is the catchall “Other” and that is actually bigger than the preceding ones.  Each of the nationalities which have been collected together is small in themselves, but when combined they constitute a small, but not insignificant, figure.

I then started looking at the figures to see how the composition of the population had changed.  That’s when I noticed that the percentages for the Dungan population for Bishkek seemed strange.  There were fewer Dungans than Uzbeks living in the capital, but the percentage figures in the table were larger.  So, I decided to investigate a little further.

Interestingly, the figures for the country as a whole in 1999 are consistent – so I presume they are correct.  I didn’t collect the date, so I don’t know for sure – but it seems a reasonable proposition.  The stated population for the country in 2009, however, is just under 60,000 less than the total for the individual nationalities are added up.  Now it might be claimed that 60,000 is not a particularly large figure when compared to the overall population of over five million – it’s only about 1.1%.

True, but notice that it represents more than ten of the different national groups identified in the table.

Add to that the furore following the parliamentary elections about the calculations of the threshold figures for the number of votes that each party had to obtain in order to win representation in the Jorgorku Kenesh – and the issue seems to raise a few, (not exactly unimportant), questions.

For the record, this is what I think the figures should be:

Kyrgyzstan:

Nationality	1999	2009	1999	2009
			%	%
Kyrgyz	3128147	3864778	64.9%	71.3%
Uzbek	664950	768405	13.8%	14.2%
Russian	603201	419583	12.5%	7.7%
Dungan	51766	58409	1.1%	1.1%
Uighur	46944	48543	1.0%	0.9%
Tajik	42636	46105	0.9%	0.9%
Turkish	33327	39133	0.7%	0.7%
Kazakh	42657	33198	0.9%	0.6%
Tatar	45438	31424	0.9%	0.6%
Ukrainian	50442	21924	1.0%	0.4%
Korean	19784	17299	0.4%	0.3%
Azerbaijani	14014	17267	0.3%	0.3%
Kurds	11620	13171	0.2%	0.2%
German	21471	9487	0.4%	0.2%
Other	46541	34057	1.0%	0.6%
Total	4822938	5422783

Bishkek:

Nationality	1999	2009	1999	2009
			%	%
Kyrgyz	398000	552957	52.2%	66.1%
Uzbek	12393	11801	1.6%	1.4%
Russian	252831	192080	33.2%	23.0%
Dungan	3558	4040	0.5%	0.5%
Uighur	13143	13800	1.7%	1.7%
Tajik	1828	917	0.2%	0.1%
Turkish	2277	3149	0.3%	0.4%
Kazakh	12064	9013	1.6%	1.1%
Tatar	15817	12712	2.1%	1.5%
Ukrainian	16125	7987	2.1%	1.0%
Korean	12700	12014	1.7%	1.4%
Azerbaijani	2454	2142	0.3%	0.3%
Kurds	0	0	0.0%	0.0%
German	5228	2554	0.7%	0.3%
Other	13800	11097	1.8%	1.3%
Total	762308	835743

Next, I asked myself the question about the changes in the composition of the population.  From the tables below, you can see how the number of certain nationalities in the Republic has changed dramatically.  In the ten years, for example, although the population of the country has grown by only 12%, the numbers of ethnic Kyrgyz has grown by double that, by almost a quarter.  The fall in the number of Russians came as a little surprise given the stories of people wanting to emigrate, and the decline in the ethnic German population surprised me only in that I was under the impression that it had occurred much earlier than 1999.  What did come as a shock to me was the fall in the number of Ukrainians and some to the other nationalities.

Kyrgyzstan:

Nationality	1999	2009	Change	%
Kyrgyz	3128147	3864778	736631	24%
Uzbek	664950	768405	103455	16%
Russian	603201	419583	-183618	-30%
Dungan	51766	58409	6643	13%
Uighur	46944	48543	1599	3%
Tajik	42636	46105	3469	8%
Turkish	33327	39133	5806	17%
Kazakh	42657	33198	-9459	-22%
Tatar	45438	31424	-14014	-31%
Ukrainian	50442	21924	-28518	-57%
Korean	19784	17299	-2485	-13%
Azerbaijani	14014	17267	3253	23%
Kurds	11620	13171	1551	13%
German	21471	9487	-11984	-56%
Other	46541	34057	-12484	-27%
Total	4822938	5422783	599845	12%

The fact that none of the Kurds in the republic apparently live in the capital struck me as interesting and so I turned my attention to that table.

The composition of the city’s population has changed in different ways compared to that of the country as a whole.  Whereas the number of Tajiks in the general population, for example, has grown by 8%, the number living in the capital has actually fallen – by about half.  Almost all the nationalities have shown declines in population – either in actual numbers of as a proportion of the city’s population, as shown in this table.

Bishkek:

Nationality	1999	2009	Change	%
Kyrgyz	398000	552957	154957	39%
Uzbek	12393	11801	-592	-5%
Russian	252831	192080	-60751	-24%
Dungan	3558	4040	482	14%
Uighur	13143	13800	657	5%
Tajik	1828	917	-911	-50%
Turkish	2277	3149	872	38%
Kazakh	12064	9013	-3051	-25%
Tatar	15817	12712	-3105	-20%
Ukrainian	16125	7987	-8138	-50%
Korean	12700	12014	-686	-5%
Azerbaijani	2454	2142	-312	-13%
Kurds	0	0	0	0%
German	5228	2554	-2674	-51%
Other	13800	11097	-2703	-20%
Total	762218	836263	74045	10%

It seems that although the population of Bishkek has grown by some 10% over the period, the city still represents roughly the same proportion of the country’s population as before, (some 15% in 2009 as opposed to 16% in 1999).

In fact there is relatively little change in the proportions of each of the nationalities that live in Bishkek as compared to the rest of the country as shown in this table:

Nationality	1999	2009	Change
Kyrgyz	13%	14%	1.6%
Uzbek	2%	2%	-0.3%
Russian	42%	46%	3.9%
Dungan	7%	7%	0.0%
Uighur	28%	28%	0.4%
Tajik	4%	2%	-2.3%
Turkish	7%	8%	1.2%
Kazakh	28%	27%	-1.1%
Tatar	35%	40%	5.6%
Ukrainian	32%	36%	4.5%
Korean	64%	69%	5.3%
Azerbaijani	18%	12%	-5.1%
Kurds	0%	0%	0.0%
German	24%	27%	2.6%
Other	30%	33%	2.9%
Total	16%	15%	-0.4%

I can see a couple of other trends emerging from the figures but, to be honest, I am not sure where all of this analysis leads … apart from the fact that the composition of the population is changing and it presents a fascinating picture.

Perhaps one of the most interesting points however, is where we started, in that the original, (official), figures  contained basic errors which should have been spotted somewhere along the line.

Don’t misunderstand me – mistakes happen.  I’m just surprised that nobody spotted them.  As a teacher of Statistics and Mathematics, one of the principal issues that we always tried to encourage in our classes was to look at the final answers or results and ask a simple question: Does this seem reasonable? – and if not, why not?

Tags: Expat, Kyrgyzstan, Life_in_Kyrgyzstan, Nationalities, Statistics