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China’s demographic crisis sparks renewed calls to lower world’s oldest legal ages for marriage
- China’s marriage rate plunged last year to just 7.63 million – the fewest since records began 36 years ago
- In China, men can get married at 22 and women can wed at 20
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China is facing renewed calls to lower its legal marriageable ages – the oldest in the world – after its number of marriages plunged to a new low last year.
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But some demographers are questioning the effectiveness of allowing people to tie the knot earlier in life, as a trend of delayed marriages is expected to continue while China becomes more urbanised and its young people shy away from the high costs of raising a family.
The number of Chinese people in their first marriages fell nearly 50 per cent to 12.28 million in 2020 from a peak of 23.85 million in 2013, according to the Chinese Marriages and Families 2022 report released by YuWa Population Research on Monday, adding that it could lead to even lower birth rates in the coming years.
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“If estimated based on a delay of about one to three years between first marriages and births, the number of births in the next few years is likely to be much lower than last year’s 10.62 million,” the report says.
“As the number of people who are getting married shows a declining trend, it can be expected that the number of first marriages will continue to decline in the next few years.”
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