South Korea’s birthrate sinks to fresh record low as population crisis deepens

South Korea’s birth rate has fallen to its lowest level since records were first kept in 1970. Photograph: YONHAP/EPA

South Korea’s demographic crisis has deepened after new data showed the number of babies born last year reached another record low.

According to figures released on Wednesday by Statistics Korea, 249,000 babies were born in 2022, a fall of 4.4% from the previous year and the third year in a row that deaths have exceeded births in Asia’s fourth-biggest economy.