STUDYING THE DYNAMICS AND STRUCTURE OF RURAL POPULATIONS: REGIONAL DIMENSION
The country's rural population accounts for up to 40 per cent of the population, and it ensures sustainable production of agricultural products, but the negative trends that arose in the 1990s lead to a decrease in the population of rural areas and the degradation of human capital. These negative trends served as the basis for the present study. The aim of the study is to assess the structure and dynamics of key indicators characterizing the rural population of the Orenburg region and its impact on the labor resources of the region. To obtain evidence conclusions, the information of Orenstat was used, to which general scientific methods and a number of mathematical and statistical methods were applied. The main results are the following: the population of the Orenburg region is declining at the interval 1990-2020, which is due to the unfavorable economic situation, natural population decline and emigration to other regions of Russia; in rural areas, there is a significant migration outflow to cities, which is associated with low living standards in rural areas; the excess of the total fertility rate in rural areas of the region over urban is offset by a high mortality rate; Over the past 30 years, there has been a steady trend of ageing in rural areas, which will exacerbate the shortage of agricultural personnel in the future; the number and proportion of the population employed in the agriculture of the Orenburg region are declining, due to a decrease in the working-age population and emigration. The results will be useful to the researcher in the field of rural employment dynamics as well as to local governments to formulate a strategy to consolidate the population in rural areas.