Life Expectancy in the Russian Far East: Dynamics of Spatial Differentiation

The article considers the features of life expectancy in the regions of the Far Eastern Federal District. The objective of the study is to analyze modern trends in life expectancy during the period of active demographic policy and to assess the contribution of age groups to the evolution of life expectancy (LE) of men and women in the regions of the Far Eastern Federal District. The author conducted a statistical analysis of official data from the Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat) on life expectancy indicators in the Far East as a whole, broken down by region, year, and gender. A decomposition of shifts in life expectancy of men and women in the regions of the Far East for the period 2004-2023 was carried out. It was found that the structure of the contribution of age groups to the growth of life expectancy of the population has significant gender and regional differences. For women, the main contribution to the growth of life expectancy is provided by older age groups from 60 years and older, for men, on the contrary, by younger age groups under 60 years. There are also processes of increasing differentiation in the indicators of life expectancy of the male and female population within the regions after the COVID-19 pandemic. At the same time, the maximum gender differences in life expectancy are noted in the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, the Republic of Buryatia and the Zabaikalsky Krai. It has been proven that in the context of increasing life expectancy in the Far East, there are processes of convergence in life expectancy indicators for women and divergence for men, which have been increasing since 2022.