why Siberia is sparsely populated
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I think because of the climate the climate of siberia is extremely cold
danger10:
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It's Cold. It's actually extraordinary cold. Winters are lethal.
The ground is frozen almost constantly. In the North of Siberia you have tundra which is Continuous Permafrost, in the South its Taiga or Discontinuous Permafrost.
With Continuos Permafrost the ground is frozen year round. This makes all or most commercial agriculture impossible. It's difficult to build buildings since you have to excavate a frozen chunk of ground to build a stable foundation. Modern roads suffer similar issues.
With Discontinuous Permafrost you have similar issues as Continuous Permafrost with the added complication that the ground thaws more often, turning into a think soup like substance. Agriculture is possible in limited areas. Road construction is a nightmare.
This is the climate issue. Then there is the challenge of socio-economics. The indigenous population of humans suffered several historic challenges over the centuries. Southern Siberia is a crossroads of sorts. Migratory Nomadic people like the Huns, Turks and eventually the Mongols swept through the region on their Westward Expansions and successively subjugated the locals. When the Russians reversed this dynamic and pushed Eastward they were harsh masters and depopulated the areas of the native peoples. Russification saw ethnic Russians coming in and exploiting the resources of fur, gold and timber where readily available but frequently at the expense of local tribes. The result was a marginalized population pushed North and into the Morse inhospitable locales in the South. By the time of the Russians much of the local population were heavily intermixed mongoloids and descendants of the Siber Khanate. This meant they were deemed as historic enemies as relatives of the Tartars. Their treatment was harsh as a result. The “native” peoples, the people of the woods, were not dissimilar to Native Americans and like their North American counterparts made for poor servants and even less enthusiastic employees.
The region suffered a long history of depopulation cycles which coupled with the harsh environment created extraordinarily slow population growth rates.
The Soviets saw the natural resources as an untapped treasure trove but had difficulty attracting voluntary settlers. Stalin in particular began progroms of forced relocation and often chose the high, Cold and remote Siberia as the ideal dumping ground of political opponents and trouble makers. This was the start of the Gulags, prison work camps, that had appalling death rates. This gave the entire region, which is enormous, an even more fearsome reputation than it already had. Continued resettlement attempts by later Soviet regimes did increase the population but that crashed when the USSR collapsed. After the fall of the Soviet Comintern many of the relocated sought to return to their original homes or to seek out better opportunities in milder climates, the population again shrank.
Today their are job opportunities in Siberia but the climate is still harsh. Much of the Russian Federation is still sparsely populated as both a result of Soviet mismanagement in the early Stalin era and the tremendous human toll the Soviet peoples paid in World War 2 and the earlier Communist Revolution.
Siberia may recover its population in time but their are many other areas of the Russian Federation that are also seeking to attract population and most have milder climates.
Siberia has a not unreasonable population when compared to similar geo-political sub-States like Alberta or Saskatchewan in Canada or its own neighbor the Sakha Republic. All by itself, Siberia would be one of the largest countries in the world by land mass but its climate leaves much of that space a less than comfortable place to live. As a result it's population is clustered in the South where it is sparse but hardly a wasteland.
Ive never visited, but have a friend who was born there and he does return to visit occasionally. The pictures he brings back are not unattractive and for the right type of person, Siberia might be a rather nice place to call home. The people are friendly and fairly industrious in the warmer months.
If you like being outside, Siberia has lots of it.
The ground is frozen almost constantly. In the North of Siberia you have tundra which is Continuous Permafrost, in the South its Taiga or Discontinuous Permafrost.
With Continuos Permafrost the ground is frozen year round. This makes all or most commercial agriculture impossible. It's difficult to build buildings since you have to excavate a frozen chunk of ground to build a stable foundation. Modern roads suffer similar issues.
With Discontinuous Permafrost you have similar issues as Continuous Permafrost with the added complication that the ground thaws more often, turning into a think soup like substance. Agriculture is possible in limited areas. Road construction is a nightmare.
This is the climate issue. Then there is the challenge of socio-economics. The indigenous population of humans suffered several historic challenges over the centuries. Southern Siberia is a crossroads of sorts. Migratory Nomadic people like the Huns, Turks and eventually the Mongols swept through the region on their Westward Expansions and successively subjugated the locals. When the Russians reversed this dynamic and pushed Eastward they were harsh masters and depopulated the areas of the native peoples. Russification saw ethnic Russians coming in and exploiting the resources of fur, gold and timber where readily available but frequently at the expense of local tribes. The result was a marginalized population pushed North and into the Morse inhospitable locales in the South. By the time of the Russians much of the local population were heavily intermixed mongoloids and descendants of the Siber Khanate. This meant they were deemed as historic enemies as relatives of the Tartars. Their treatment was harsh as a result. The “native” peoples, the people of the woods, were not dissimilar to Native Americans and like their North American counterparts made for poor servants and even less enthusiastic employees.
The region suffered a long history of depopulation cycles which coupled with the harsh environment created extraordinarily slow population growth rates.
The Soviets saw the natural resources as an untapped treasure trove but had difficulty attracting voluntary settlers. Stalin in particular began progroms of forced relocation and often chose the high, Cold and remote Siberia as the ideal dumping ground of political opponents and trouble makers. This was the start of the Gulags, prison work camps, that had appalling death rates. This gave the entire region, which is enormous, an even more fearsome reputation than it already had. Continued resettlement attempts by later Soviet regimes did increase the population but that crashed when the USSR collapsed. After the fall of the Soviet Comintern many of the relocated sought to return to their original homes or to seek out better opportunities in milder climates, the population again shrank.
Today their are job opportunities in Siberia but the climate is still harsh. Much of the Russian Federation is still sparsely populated as both a result of Soviet mismanagement in the early Stalin era and the tremendous human toll the Soviet peoples paid in World War 2 and the earlier Communist Revolution.
Siberia may recover its population in time but their are many other areas of the Russian Federation that are also seeking to attract population and most have milder climates.
Siberia has a not unreasonable population when compared to similar geo-political sub-States like Alberta or Saskatchewan in Canada or its own neighbor the Sakha Republic. All by itself, Siberia would be one of the largest countries in the world by land mass but its climate leaves much of that space a less than comfortable place to live. As a result it's population is clustered in the South where it is sparse but hardly a wasteland.
Ive never visited, but have a friend who was born there and he does return to visit occasionally. The pictures he brings back are not unattractive and for the right type of person, Siberia might be a rather nice place to call home. The people are friendly and fairly industrious in the warmer months.
If you like being outside, Siberia has lots of it.
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