South Korea saw its largest-ever gain in birth rate over the first five months of 2025, its statistics agency said Wednesday. File Photo by Yonhap/EPA-EFE
SEOUL, July 23 (UPI) -- South Korea recorded its largest-ever gain in birth rate over the first five months of the year, its statistics agency said Wednesday, in a slight respite from a looming demographic crisis.
The cumulative number of births from January through May reached 106,048, up by 6.9% over the same period last year, according to data from Statistics Korea. It represents the highest rate of increase since data collection began in 1981.
Some 20,309 babies were born in May, up 3.8% from the 19,567 babies born one year ago. The on-year increase was the largest since May 2011, when the figure grew by 5.3%.
The number of births has risen for 11 consecutive months, the agency said. May's fertility rate was 0.75, up 0.02 from a year earlier.
