| A North Korean woman walks on a street in Pyongyang carrying a baby in this July file photo. Joint Press Corps |
By Jung Da-min
Global trends towards smaller families and low birth rates are also being seen in North Korea, according to the United Nations Population Fund's (UNFPA) "State of World Population 2018" report, released Wednesday.
The report said the "total fertility rate (TFR)" in North Korea stood at 1.9 this year and remained below the replacement rate of 2.1, required to maintain a stable population in the country. The TFR is a statistical indicator of the average number of children born during the lifetime of a woman between the ages 15 and 49.
The report also said 75 percent of North Korean women practice contraception by any method, with 71 percent using "modern methods" such as pills, condoms and intrauterine devices. The figures are similar to those in South Korea ― 78 percent and 70 percent, respectively.
"North Korean women often use an intrauterine device (IUD), often called a loop, as a method of contraception that inserts a small ring of plastic or copper around the uterus," said Lee Hae-won, a doctor of family medicine at Seoul Medical Center. "The low birth rate, however, is not directly linked to the high use of IUDs, as many North Korean women cannot afford to replace the device as often as required."
Despite the poor conditions for maintaining contraceptive devices, the high percentage of women practicing contraception indicates the trend of having fewer children in North Korea, according to Park Young-ja, a director at the Korea Institute for National Unification's (KINU) North Korean Research Division.
Park says North Korea's accelerated urbanization and strengthened autonomy of women, who have been leading the country's market economy, are among the reasons.
"The decline in the birth rate was first observed after the Arduous March in the 1990s with economic hardship, but things have been changed as more women have been leading the country's market economy development since then," Park said. "North Korean women now want to have fewer babies and smaller families with growing enthusiasm for education, and the decline in the birth rate is particularly observed among well-educated women in urban areas."
Meanwhile, South Korea's TFR stood at 1.3 this year according to the UNFPA report, also remaining steady in recent years.
As the birth rates in the two Koreas both fall below the replacement rate, experts say there could be a limit to economic development of the Korean peninsula, even after unification.
Aging is also a problem in the two Koreas, with the population of 65 or older standing at 9 percent in North Korea and 14 percent in South Korea. A country is labeled as "aging," if the population of 65 or older is over 7 percent of the total, while it is "aged" when it passes the 14 percent threshold, according to the United Nations' definition.