It has long been accepted that our people have one, their own “nationality” – the Norilsk people. According to the 2010 census, people from 77 different nationalities live in Norilsk. It is not a surprise that perhaps the most numerous were the russians – in Norilsk there were 129 545 of them, as well as ukrainians (9 165), azerbaijanis (5 371), tatars (2 972), chuvashs (1 211), bashkirs (1 155), belarusians (1 133), nganasans (929), ossetians (921), nogais (910) and kazakhs (800). There are about 700 greeks in the city, 616 moldavians, 497 germans, 413 kyrgyz, 350 armenians, 286 mari, 291 turkmens, 152 dolgans, 78 nenets.
According to the same census, the rarest nationalities of Norilsk are evenks (22), rutuls (12), altai (11 people), karelians (10), kets (9), shors (6), enets (6), tsakhurs (5) , mountain jews (5), kurds (5), Mordva-Erzya (5), digor ossetians (4), lazes (4).
However, when considering the national composition of the population, two important points must be kept in mind. First, in accordance with the Constitution of the Russian Federation, during a survey within the All-Russian Census, nationality was indicated on the basis of self-determination and recorded from the words of the respondents. Secondly, a person had the right not to answer this question. Nevertheless, Norilsk respondents answered the question, and we can say for sure that the multinationality of our city is vividly represented: diasporas are open, national-cultural associations are working, holidays of unity of various ethnic groups are held.
And in the end, take a look at the general data of the region, which includes our vibrant and multinational city. In general, according to ARC-2010, in the Krasnoyarsk region, there were 17 nationalities, the number of which exceeded 3,000 people. In addition to russians, the leaders are ukrainians, tatars, germans, azerbaijanis, chuvashs, armenians, belarusians. Also, the census gave a complete picture of the indigenous peoples of the North. 5 810 dolgans, 4 372 evenks, 3 633 nenets, 807 nganasans and 221 enets lived in the region in 2010.
We’ll find out very soon how the statistics will change: the next All-Russian population census is scheduled for October 2020.
Text: Victor Tsaryov, Photo: Olga Polyanskaya
