Women the majority in many Dutch student cities

Many Dutch municipalities with a university or college have more young female residents than young male residents, Statistics Netherlands reported on Wednesday. The difference is biggest in Utrecht, where there are only 73 men for every 100 women in the age group 20 to 25 years old.

Leiden counts 74 young men for a 100 young women, Maastricht 76, Nijmegen 77 and Wageningen 79. Also in Amstelveen and Weesp, where many Amsterdam students live, there are more young women than young men.

Municipalities with a technical university, on the other hand, tend to count more young male residents than young female residents. In Delft there are 170 young men for every 100 young women, in Eindhoven 126 men for 100 women, in Enschede 124 and Hengelo 113. According to Statistics Netherlands this is because young women are less likely to opt for a technical study than young men. On Terschelling there are vastly more young men than young women - 250 men for every 100 women. The stats office attributes this to the presence of the Maritime Institute on the island.

According to Statistics Netherlands, the fact that more young women live in university cities than young men has to do with young women moving out of their parental home quicker than their male counterparts. At the start of this year 55 percent of 21-year-old women still lived with their parents, compared to 69 percent of their male counterpart. Another factor is that more female students are enrolled in the Dutch universities and colleges. In the past school year the Dutch universities counted 94 male students for every 100 female students. Ten years ago that was 98 men for 100 women.

On January 1st of this year the Netherlands had 1.1 million residents between the ages of 20 and 25 years old. Women are the slight minority in this group - there are 103 men for every 100 women. Every year around 5 percent more boys are born than girls, and this ratio is still visible in the early 20s age group. However, women generally live longer than men, so in the total Dutch population women have a slight majority - 99 men for every 100 women.