photo Source: central Photo Gallery
South Korea has the lowest average number of children per woman in the world. The proportion of people aged 0-14 years is the lowest in the world, while the proportion of people over 65 years old is far more than the average. This is the current state of South Korean society plagued by low fertility and aging.
A Korean version of the State of the World`s Population 2020 report was translated and published on 30 June by the Korean Association for Population Health and Welfare and the Common Country Population Foundation (INFPA). According to the report, the total population of Korea is currently 51.3 million, with an average annual population growth rate of 0.2% in 2015-2020, which is much lower than the world average population growth rate (1.1%).
South Korea`s total fertility rate is 1.1(198th), the lowest in the world. Total fertility rate refers to the average number of children per woman, the world`s average total fertility rate is 2.4, and South Korea`s total fertility rate is less than half of the average.
In addition to the problem of low fertility, the aging of the Korean population is also very prominent. The proportion of the population aged 0-14 is 12.5 per cent, only half of the global average (25.4 per cent). Only Japan (12.4 per cent) and Singapore (12.3 per cent) accounted for less people aged 0-14 years than South Korea.
On the contrary, the proportion of people over 65 in Korea is as high as 15.8%, which is much higher than the world average (9.3%). Only Japan (28.4 per cent), Italy (23.3 per cent) and Portugal (22.8 per cent) had a higher proportion of the population over the age of 65 than South Korea.
The Korea Association for Population Health and Welfare (KHAW) indicated that the report was data inferred by the Common Country (UN) economic social committee based on information such as the World Population Outlook report, and that there may be a gap with the official statistics government Korea.
