Korea shatters its personal file for world’s lowest fertility charge

South Korea has as soon as once more shattered its personal file for the world’s lowest fertility charge because it faces the prospect of its inhabitants of 51 million individuals greater than halving by the top of this century.

Korean girls had been estimated, based mostly on 2021 knowledge, to have a median of simply 0.81 youngsters over their lifetimes, down from 0.84 a 12 months earlier, the statistics workplace stated Wednesday. The variety of newborns declined final 12 months to 260,600, which equates to about 0.5% of the inhabitants.

Korea is the world’s fastest-aging nation amongst economies with per capita GDP of no less than $30,000, based on United Nations world inhabitants projections and World Bank knowledge. By 2100, its inhabitants will fall by 53% to 24 million, up from a 43% decline forecast in 2019.

The forecast is a sobering reminder of the demographic risk and related financial challenges confronting Bank of Korea Governor Rhee Chang-yong and President Yoon Suk Yeol, who each took workplace earlier this 12 months.

Rhee warned in April that South Korea’s economic system faces the chance of secular stagnation because the inhabitants ages and productiveness slows. He stated rising welfare spending would take away from the finance wanted to spice up financial progress, a key objective set out by Yoon in his inauguration pledges.

A shrinking workforce is a significant factor within the decline of Korea’s potential progress charge. The working-age inhabitants peaked at 37.3 million in 2020 and is ready to fall by nearly half by 2070, based on Statistics Korea.

While looking for to sluggish the decline within the delivery charge, Korea can be enacting a sequence of measures to dwell with the brand new actuality, enhancing residing situations for retirees and introducing extra robots. Inviting extra girls, aged individuals and foreigners into the workforce is one other objective.

The variety of girls of child-bearing age fell 2% to 11,620,000 final 12 months, signaling the fertility charge is barely more likely to deteriorate additional. A typical Korean girl gave delivery to her first baby at age 32.6, up from 30.2 a decade earlier, based on the stats workplace. Her associate on common could be 35.1, in contrast with 33 a decade earlier.

By area, the capital Seoul confirmed the bottom fertility charge at 0.63, whereas Sejong, dwelling to authorities headquarters, had the very best at 1.28, based on the stats workplace. The most populous province, Gyeonggi, recorded 0.85, nearer to the common.

In the a long time following the 1950-53 Korean War, the inhabitants no less than doubled and in an effort to curb the child increase within the early years of financial improvement, the federal government inspired {couples} to have just one baby.

That coverage was scrapped across the flip of the century as births began to sharply fall, prompting the federal government to spend tens of billion of {dollars} every year to encourage extra youngsters, however with little success to date.