In March, Latvian President Andris Berzins said that if massive emigration from his country does not stop, its independence will be in doubt 10 years from now. The same could be said of Estonia and Lithuania. From 1990 to 2011, Lithuania's population fell from 3.6 million to 3 million. Over the same period, the population of Latvia declined from 2.6 million to 2 million, while Estonia's fell from 1.5 million to 1.3 million. These declines were partly due to low fertility rates, which have remained below the replacement level of 2.1 children per woman (the number of births needed to keep population levels stable) for more than two decades. Fertility rates have improved slightly over the past decade due to policies applied by each national government, but they are still among the lowest in the European Union.