in the 2004 census, 2,564,542 people (75.8% of the population of the country) declared their native language as "moldovan" or "romanian"; 2,495,977 (73.8%) speak it as first language in daily use. apart from being the first language of use for 94.5% of ethnic moldovans and 97.6% of ethnic romanians, the language is also spoken as primary by 5.8% of ethnic russians, 7.7% of ethnic ukrainians, 2.3% of ethnic gagauz, 8.7% of ethnic bulgarians, and 14.4% of other ethnic minorities.