Latvia

Women

Latvia ranks 41 out of 162 countries in the Gender Inequality Index, where a high rank equals high equality. Women should always be considered as a particularly vulnerable group though.

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Children

Latvia has a Workplace Index score of 2.5, a Marketplace Index score of 4.2 and a Community and Environment Index score of 3.2 in the Children’s Rights and Business Atlas, where countries receive scores between 0 and 10. A score closer to 0 reflects a need for basic children’s rights due diligence, while a higher score reflects a need for enhanced or heightened due diligence. Children should always be considered as a particularly vulnerable group though. 

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Persons with Disabilities

Due to differences in data collection and definitions it is difficult to compare countries on disability prevalence rates. Persons with disabilities should always be considered as a particularly vulnerable group though.

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Minorities and Indigenous Peoples

According to the World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples, the main minority groups in Latvia are Russians (25.6 %), Belarusians (3.4 %), Ukrainians (2.3 %) and Poles (2.1 %). Latvia is also home to dozens of much smaller ethnic groups, including Moldovans, Azeris, Chuvash, Georgians and Livs (also referred to as Livonians). There is a high rate of ethnic intermarriage in the country. Lithuanians are, like Poles, one of several historic minorities in Latvia. Other historic minorities include Jews. Less than 10 % of the pre-war Jewish population survived the Holocaust. Jews registered the highest rate of emigration from the late 1980s, and the Jewish population was declining by 2 % a year during the early 1990s as a result of intermarriage and assimilation. While a few thousand Jewish refugees returned to Latvia after World War II, most Jews are descended from those who settled there from elsewhere in the Soviet Union. Livs, alongside Latvians, are considered indigenous peoples. Only a small number of Livs, almost all elderly, still know their native language. Baltic Germans have played an important role within Latvia’s territory as they formed the majority of the political and economic elite since the thirteenth century. In the 1930s Germans were the fourth largest ethnic group, but most left the country during World War II as a result of ‘repatriation’ policies that saw many Baltic Germans relocated.

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Migrant Workers​

According to the ILO Global Estimates on International Migrant Workers, migrant workers as a proportion of all workers is 18.4 % in the subregion Northern, Southern and Western Europe.

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Persons in Armed Conflict

Latvia ranks 146 out of 179 countries in the Fragile States Index, where a high rank equals high fragility. For monthly crisis updates, check out CrisisWatch.