The country has one of the lowest birth rates in the world.
The birth rate of South Korea increased in 2024, breaking a nine -year strip of uninterrupted trendy trend.
According to a statistical Korea report of February 26, KST, the fertility rate of the country increased by 0.03 percent in 2024. This news aroused a significant public discourse as South Korea was grappling with a demographic crisis due to the drop in the birth rate and the increase in the elderly population.
The preliminary evaluation of the South Korean government showed that, on average, a South Korean woman gave birth to 0.75 children in her life in 2024. The number was 0.73 in 2023. In 2015, this figure was 1.24 and since then she saw a constant decline.
Statistics Korea has attributed this increase in the fertility rate to a greater number of women in the educational age group of children, pending weddings pending a break due to the epidemic of Covid-19 and an overall positive perspective towards marriage and childbirth.
The number of babies in South Korea reached 238,343 in 2024, 3.6 percent more than the previous year. This is also the first time in nine years in which the number has seen an increase. In 2015, it increased by 0.7 percent to 438,420 and has since gradually decreased until 2023.
You Hye Mi, the senior presidential secretary for the planning of the population, held a press conference on Wednesday and accredited this increase in the birth rate to Yoon Suk Yeol The rapid implementation of the administrative policies of the Administration to combat demographic challenges. He refers specifically to measures such as loans and residential support provided by the government to spouses couples, in addition to the benefits for companies to adopt families for families by encouraging employees to use parental leave.
Despite the increase in number, the birth rate of South Korea will probably remain the lowest of the 38 OECD countries. Starting from 2022, South Korea was the only member country with a fertility rate of less than 1.
While it has long been said that demographic challenges completely threaten the existence of the Korean society, a recent study revealed that the extinction so feared would not have happened soon. Read more about it here:
The Netizen Koreans give unexpected reactions to the possible temporal sequence of extinction of South Korea
