The number of babies born in South Korea in 2022 hit a new all-time low as deaths once again exceeded births in the Asian country for the third year in a row, according to data released today. .
According to figures from the Korea Bureau of Statistics, a total of 249,000 babies were born last year, down 4.4 percent from 2021, when a record low was also recorded.
The fertility rate – the average number of children a woman has over her lifetime – in South Korea was 0.78 in 2022, marking the fifth consecutive year that the figure is below 1. and the level the lowest since 1970, the year the data began. to collect in this area.
The birth rate of Asia’s fourth-largest economy has been, for a decade and by far, the lowest of the 38 member countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
Experts estimate the rate would need to be around 2.1 to keep South Korea’s population stable, which stands at just over 51 million.
The average age at which South Koreans have their first child increased in 2022 to 33.5 years, 0.2 years older than the previous year.
For years, many South Korean couples have been pushing back the age at which they have children or are choosing not to have children, citing factors such as the economic downturn or the high cost of housing.
For their part, more and more South Koreans are highlighting in surveys the burden of having a child in a very patriarchal society where in many cases they are forced to leave their jobs and devote themselves entirely to household chores. once they have given birth to the light.
In contrast, South Korea’s death toll in 2022 was 372,800, up 17.4% from the previous year and representing a record difference (around 123,000) from the number of births.
The Asian country, which in the 80s recorded a population growth of more than 600,000 inhabitants per year, began to point to negative growth in 2020.