South Korea, Taiwan Have World’s Lowest Birth Rate



By Kang Shin-who

Staff Reporter



South Korea, along with Taiwan, has the world’s lowest birth rate according to the ``2006 World Population’’ report released Friday by the Population Reference Bureau (PRB). The report noted that South Korean women give birth to an average 1.1 children. Hong Kong and Macao have lower birth rates but are considered part of China.



Despite the government's efforts, the birthrate is lower than last year’s 1.2, indicating Korean women are reluctant to have babies or are delaying having babies.



The country’s birth and death rate per 1,000 people was nine and five, respectively, and the rate of population increase was 0.4 percent, lower than last year’s 0.5 percent.



Accordingly, the population is predicted to decrease 13 percent to 42.3 million by 2050 and rising to 49.8 million in 2025.



Nineteen percent of the population is 15 or under, and 10 percent is 65 or older. The average life expectancy of South Koreans is 77 years _ 81 for women and 74 for men, the demographic report said.



Although China tries to restrict the number of newborns, its fertility rate is 1.6, much higher than South Korea’s, while the Japanese fertility rate is 1.3 and North Korea’s 2.



``Population growth in some developing countries, such as South Korea, is slowing dramatically, while others continue to grow,’’ said Bill Butz, president of the population bureau.



With many people worrying about a declining birth rate and an aging population, the government is planning policies to raise the birth rate.



It has come up with some broad measures to deal with the issue such as tax breaks for parents, social insurance benefits, and subsidies for childcare expenses.



Some criticize women for focusing on their careers rather than having children.



``Even though the country faces a low-rate birth rate, women are only striving to land jobs and complain that men can have advantage in finding jobs because they get special favors after serving compulsory military service,’’ said Park Chan-woo, an official.



Women’s groups stress that cooperation with men is needed to overcome the problem.



``Women are not solely responsible for the low birth rate. Men need to make it easy for women have babies by sharing home affairs,’’ said Jo Suk-hyon of the Korean Women’s International Network.







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08-18-2006 17:26

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