A record number of immigrants and a higher birth rate helped boost the population in the Netherlands by some 73,000 last year, the national statistics office CBS said on Wednesday.

Immigration accounted for almost 37,000 of the increase, while the birth rate outstripped the number of people dying by over 35,000, the CBS figures show. Some 16.8 million people now live in the Netherlands.

In total, 181,000 immigrants arrived in Holland, of whom 24,000 were Polish and 22,000 returning Dutch nationals, the CBS said.

Figures released by the CBS last summer show that after Poles, refugees from Syria accounted for the next biggest group of new arrivals, followed by Germany, Romania and India.

Poles are now the fifth biggest foreign population group in the Netherlands, behind people born in Turkey, Morocco, the Antillean islands and Indonesia.

At the same time, 144,000 people left the country, giving a net increase of 37,000.

Most of the people leaving were from western countries, including almost 12,000 Poles. Germans were the next biggest group of leavers.

Some 30,000 Dutch people also emigrated to other countries, a figure which has remained constant since 2009, the CBS said.