This country will now get its own ministry for birth rates. Here's all you need to know about it

Seoul, South Korea

In an unprecedented move to tackle low birth rates in South Korea, the country's President Yoon Suk Yeol made a unique announcement: establishing a ministry to address the issue.

The president said that he plans to establish a new government ministry which will handle the “national emergency” of the infamously low birth rate of the country which is grappling with a demographic crisis.

President Suk Yeol, in a televised address, stated that he will ask for the co-operation of the parliament in establishing the Ministry of Low Birth Rate Counter-planning.

“We will mobilise all of the nation’s capabilities to overcome the low birth rate, which can be considered a national emergency,” President Yeol said.

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Later speaking in his first press conference held since August 2022 to mark two years in office, Yoon accepted that his administration has fallen short in its efforts to improve the lives of people.

He vowed that the next three years of his term would be used to improve the economy and address the issue of low births.

The country's demographic crisis is likely to have been caused because of a number of factors. These include the frustrations of Korean couples with the rising cost of living and deteriorating quality of life. 

President Yeol calls for improvement in economic performance 

President Yeol said that there is a need to improve the country's economic performance. 

"I think the important thing going forward is indeed the economy. Corporate growth and job creation are important too but what I think is more important is to try harder to look for what is inconvenient in the life of each and every person and to resolve them," said the South Korean president.

While speaking at the conference, he was standing behind a plaque which read: “The Buck Stops Here”.

The ministry is set to address the challenges which will contribute to the fast-ageing population and record low birth rate.

"This is not a matter we can take time to work on," he stated.

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The South Korean government as well as policymakers have been making efforts to discover new and innovative measures for addressing the crisis of decreasing child birth rates. 

The fertility rate of South Korea, which is the number of children a woman is expected to give birth to in her lifetime - decreased to 0.72 in 2023, which has fallen by eight per cent from 2022, as per the preliminary data from Statistics Korea in February.

In order to motivate parents, the government has introduced a scheme in which South Korean couples will receive financial assistance from 35 million won (approx. $25763) to 50 million won (approx. $36804) in the form of different incentive and support programmes from the time of the birth of their child till they become seven year old.

(With inputs from agencies)