Recently released Chinese government statistics show marriages continue to decline, with only 4.75 million couples registering in the third quarter.
Chinese policymakers are urgently trying to address a plummeting birth rate, fearing that the rapidly aging workforce and burden on social safety nets will drag on the world’s second-largest economy. Despite various initiatives, including financial incentives and social campaigns encouraging young couples to start families, progress has been elusive.
Last month, the National Health Commission’s China Population and Development Research Center announced it was surveying 30,000 women across 150 counties in a bid to better understand prevailing attitudes toward parenthood.
Local officials have even reportedly taken to calling women of reproductive age asking them why they are not having children. Newsweek reached out to the Chinese embassy in Washington, D.C., with a written request for comment.
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This figure marks a 16.6 percent drop from the 5.69 million recorded in the same period last year, the year after the country ended its stringent “zero-COVID” policies.
The numbers also represent less than one-third of the 13.5 million marriages registered from January to September 2013, when marriages peaked.
Moreover, marriage registrations in the first nine months of this of this year were down nearly 30 percent compared to the same period in 2022, a time when the pandemic lockdowns still heavily impacted daily life.
Meanwhile, divorce figures showed little change. Nearly 1.97 million divorces were registered, a similar number to the previous year, but much higher than the 1.01 million divorces recorded in 2022.
China’s East Asian neighbors are also grappling with similar problems, characterized by rapidly aging populations and younger generations increasingly hesitant to have families. South Korea, which has the world’s lowest fertility rate at 0.72 births per woman, is even launching a new government ministry tasked with addressing demographic issues.
To combat the marriage decline, China is revising legislation to make marriage registration process simpler.
Currently, the system requires marriage registration to be tied to a spouse’s official household registration, or “hukou.” This linkage can complicate access to education, employment, and social services, particularly for couples from different regions, making it difficult to decide where to live and raise a family.
Additionally, the draft law retains the “cooling-off” period for divorces, first implemented in January 2021. This 30-day window allows either party to withdraw the application, thereby stopping the divorce process.
While the policy aims to reduce impulsive separations, it has sparked widespread debate, prompting criticism that the delay could unnecessarily prolong unhappy marriages and may be detrimental in cases of domestic abuse.
