Saba population has grown slightly

© ANP
Between January 2011 and January 2016, the population of Saba increased by 6 percent to 1.9 thousand inhabitants. This was predominantly the result of immigration, Statistics Netherlands (CBS) reports.
In the period January 2011 to December 2015, Saba’s immigrants outnumbered emigrants by 150. Many North American medical students pursue part of their training on Saba, raising immigration figures. The largest group were from Canada with 750 immigrants, followed by the United States with 550 immigrants. In the same period, 300 Saba inhabitants emigrated to the US and 550 to Canada. The destination country of some 35 percent of emigrants is unknown. The majority are likely medical students who returned to their country of origin.

Negative net migration after population register clean-up

Saba’s population register was cleaned up between 2011 and 2013. As the clean-up showed, a number of people who were registered as island residents were no longer residing there. They were subsequently recorded as emigrants, resulting in a negative net migration rate for 2013 and 2014. Their actual emigration probably took place spread over previous years.

Many moves to Caribbean Netherlands

Between January 2011 and December 2015, more people settled in the Caribbean Netherlands (Bonaire, Saba and St Eustatius) than left. Net migration stood at 2.7 thousand. In the same period, around 10 thousand people moved to one of the three islands while slightly over 7 thousand people left the islands. The Caribbean Netherlands is especially popular among residents of the European Netherlands, Central and South America, Curaçao, the US and Canada.
On Bonaire between 1 January 2011 and 1 January 2016, the population grew by over 20 percent to 19.4 thousand residents. On St Eustatius the population declined by 13 percent to 3.2 thousand residents. This is related to a clean-up of the population register which took place in 2015.

Sources