Turkey to add incentives to have babies amid birth rate decline
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Turkey's birth rate has been steadily declining in the past decade.
PHOTO: BLOOMBERG
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ISTANBUL – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan broadened financial pledges for families and newlyweds to encourage births amid a shrinking population likely to weigh on economic growth.
“For the first time in our history, our elderly population is over 10 per cent of the total while our average age has edged up to 34,” Mr Erdogan said in Ankara on Jan 13.
Three children per family should be the goal, he said, reiterating a decades-long objective.
Slumps in birth are a challenge for many countries
Turkey’s birth rate fell to 1.51 in 2023, compared with 2.38 in 2001, and Mr Erdogan declared 2025 as the “year of family” to try to address the situation.
Turkey will increase financial aid, Mr Erdogan said, with a one-off 5,000 liras (S$193) being awarded on the arrival of a firstborn.
“We are also implementing child aid of 1,500 liras per month for the second child and 5,000 liras per month for the third and more,” he said.
Newlyweds will be able to benefit from a family fund that provides up to 150,000 liras with no interest and a two-year postponement in repayment. The fund was previously available to those hit by Turkey’s devastating earthquakes in February 2023.
A note of caution lies in how other countries, such as South Korea
Turkey’s population in 2023 was 85.4 million, with the ratio of children aged between zero and 14 falling to 21.4 per cent compared with 26.4 per cent in 2007. The birth rate has been steadily declining in the past decade.
Ankara-based think-tank Tepav said in a report in 2024 that economic conditions and unemployment are among the factors that can contribute to a fall in the birth rate.
Cost of living
Turkey has reeled from one of the worst cost-of-living crises in decades, with inflation nearing triple digits in recent years as Mr Erdogan pushed for cheap credit stimulus to secure popularity in the run-up to elections.
That policy has translated to unanchored housing prices and rent, as well as costly education fees.
“Economic conditions and worries about making a living are causing many families to delay or completely pass on having children,” the Tepav report said.
“High inflation and an increase in living costs aggravate the burden of raising a child.”
Turkey has since reversed its fiscal and monetary policy, with Central Bank governor Fatih Karahan leading the push to boost rates to tame spiralling prices before cuts began in December.
Annual price growth slowed to 44 per cent in December as a result, with policymakers aiming to get it to 21 per cent by the end of 2025. Rent remains one of the main contributors to the inflation readings.
“We estimate a diminishing contribution from labour to output in the decades to come, and this will turn negative by 2040,” Ms Selva Bahar Baziki of Bloomberg Economics said in a note published in 2024. BLOOMBERG
