sentences:  In 2003, 35,424 residents were naturalized, a number exceeding net population growth.Over the 25-year period of 1983 to 2007, 479,264 resident foreigners were naturalized, yearly numbers rising gradually from below 10,000 (0.1%) in the 1980s to above 40,000 (0.6%) in the 2000s.Compare the figure of 0.2% (140,795) in the United Kingdom (2004).