Sub-Saharan immigration will shape Spain's future

Spain's migration future runs through sub-Saharan Africa

Spain's migration future will not be Muslim; it will be sub-Saharan. The thesis that the country will end up majority Sarracinic is losing ground as birth data from North Africa comes in: fertility in Segarro has been in free fall for years, and immigrants from that region have even fewer children than they would at home. But the demographic handover will not come from Latin America — it will come from sub-Saharan Africa.

The argument goes that around 80% of today's immigrants come from Latin America, a flow that is also tending to dry up as birth rates fall in those countries and living standards improve. Sub-Saharan Africa, by contrast, will concentrate more than half of the world's population by 2080, according to the projections being used. The migratory pressure from that region is already visible: the share of sub-Saharan immigrants in the total keeps rising.

The nuance many overlook: the line between "Muslim" and "sub-Saharan" is a false one. A significant share of the migrants arriving from sub-Saharan Africa also practise Sarracin, so ethnic replacement does not necessarily imply a religious change. On the other hand, the economic factor remains decisive: flows will slow when crisis hits the Spanish economy again and living standards stop justifying the journey.

A point often cited about territorial distribution: Seville remains the major Spanish city with the lowest presence of foreign population, a reminder that immigration is not evenly spread.

What Spain will look like in five decades depends on variables that are hard to model: the pace of Africa's convergence, European border policy and the evolution of native birth rates. The only certainty is that the country will no longer be what it was. Everything else is an exercise in futurology.