He said, “There were 712 more births than in 2002. Around 9000 more people moved to Scotland, from the rest of the UK and from the wider world, than moved away. That is good news for those who are alarmed at the prospect of demographic decline.”

However, there had been big variations between local authority areas. Mr Macniven released population data for all 32 councils between 1993 and 2003.

This showed that Dundee suffered one of the biggest drops, down 7.1% to 143,000 people. Only Western Isles and Inverclyde lost bigger percentages of their populations. But Perth and Kinross proved to be one of the fast-growing areas, up 4.2% over the same period to 136,000. Only East and West Lothian and Stirling saw larger increases.

Mr Macniven pointed out, “Population trends are hard to predict. Despite the small increase to Scotland’s population last year, we face a challenge of a declining and ageing population in the future.

“Fertility rates remain lower than the rest of the UK and are declining faster. Our death rate, though better than a decade ago, rose slightly last year and remains stubbornly higher than the rest of the UK.”

Within the European Union, only Hungary and the three Baltic states have worse death rates. Cancer and heart disease remain the biggest killers, accounting for 46% of deaths.

Scotland’s long-term population trend remains downward, with the five million mark expected to be breached by 2009. However, life expectancy continues to rise, to 73.5 years for men and 78.8 years for women.

The Registrar General’s report also shows there were more weddings in Scotland last year than since 1994, although many of those were “tourist” ceremonies, where the bride and bridegroom have no connection to the country but come here because it is a romantic place to get married.

There was, however, an increase of 800 in the number of Scots-resident marriages, partly because of the change in the law to allow civil ceremonies to take place outside registration offices.

Mr Macniven’s report also looked at migration to and from Scotland from other parts of the UK and from abroad. There was a net inflow of 19-year-olds, reflecting the large number of students coming to Scottish universities, but a net outflow at age 23, suggesting many leave again after completing their education.