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Mandy Zuo

Beijing should drastically raise its nationwide childcare subsidies to stave off a deepening birth crisis, according to Chinese scholars, who warned the country’s fertility rate could soon fall to the lowest in the world unless action was taken.
The government should learn from the examples of Singapore and South Korea – two nearby countries facing similarly severe demographic challenges, which have both introduced enhanced pronatalist policies to turn around the situation, they added.
Beijing introduced a nationwide childcare subsidy last year that offers households a total of 10,800 yuan (US$1,600) per child, but the scholars said far higher payments would be needed to make people more willing to have more children.
James Liang, a business leader and demographer, has called for a subsidy package worth 62,000 yuan per child to be introduced, arguing that such a move could boost China’s fertility rate by 25 per cent over the next couple of years.
He Yafu, another independent demographer, has said subsidies of at least 72,000 yuan per child – more than six times the current national package – would be necessary to help families deal with the high cost of raising children.
The calls followed news that Singapore had introduced a generous new support package for parents, and the release of birth figures from South Korea suggesting that the nation’s pronatalist policies were leading to an uptick in fertility.
On Wednesday, South Korean authorities announced that total births in June, the second quarter and the first half of the year had all reached their highest levels for those periods in nearly seven years.
A few days earlier, Singapore unveiled a new child-support package providing up to S$62,000 (US$48,750) per child as part of an effort to boost the nation’s falling birth rate.


Last year, South Korea posted a total fertility rate of 0.8 – the lowest in the world, though an increase from previous years. The rates in Singapore and China were 0.87 and 1.0, respectively, according to both researchers.
The total fertility rate refers to the average number of children a woman is expected to have in her lifetime. A rate of 1.0 is far below the replacement level of 2.1 required to maintain a stable population.
“If China does not significantly strengthen its fertility support policies, its fertility rate is likely to fall below those of South Korea and Singapore in a few years and rank at the bottom globally,” warned Liang, executive chairman of travel company Trip.com and co-founder of the YuWa Population Research Institute.
Cash handouts have been a major factor behind the recent rebound in South Korea’s birth figures, according to Liang. In 2021, the country’s childcare subsidies were worth about 1.6 per cent of gross domestic product per capita, but that figure shot up to 2.7 per cent in 2022 and 4.8 per cent in 2025, he said.
To match the 2025 level in South Korea, China should give households 855 yuan per month for every child until they turn six years old, or a total of around 62,000 yuan per child, Liang said.
Such a move would raise China’s fertility rate to 1.25 within a few years, according to Liang’s research.
Last year, China started providing an annual childcare subsidy of 3,600 yuan for every child born on or after January 1, 2025, until they turn three years old – a package worth up to 10,800 yuan per child. Some local governments have also introduced their own subsidies.
But the payments were a “drop in the bucket” compared with the high cost of raising children, said the other demographer He, who called for subsidies of at least 1,000 yuan a month per child until the age of six.
Singapore’s latest support programme had come as it risked replacing South Korea as the world’s lowest-fertility country this year, according to He. The reaction was worthy of attention in China, which was facing its own deepening demographic challenges, He added.
Over the past decade, China’s annual births have more than halved – plunging from nearly 18 million in 2016 to under 8 million in 2025. The country’s population has also been shrinking every year since peaking in 2021, according to official figures.
“The core bottlenecks behind low fertility in East Asian countries are highly consistent: excessively high child-rearing costs, intense educational competition and insufficient childcare supply,” He said. “The childbearing burden must be eased in terms of both economic and time costs, including by substantially increasing childcare subsidies and vigorously expanding inclusive, affordable childcare services.”


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China’s fertility rate could soon fall to world’s lowest unless action is taken, as current subsidies are ‘a drop in the bucket’, scholars warn


China’s fertility rate could soon fall to world’s lowest unless action is taken, as current subsidies are ‘a drop in the bucket’, scholars warn.


China needs 600% child subsidy rise to prevent deeper birth crisis: scholars

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}China’s fertility rate could soon fall to world’s lowest unless action is taken, as current subsidies are ‘a drop in the bucket’, scholars warn

China’s fertility rate could soon fall to world’s lowest unless action is taken, as current subsidies are ‘a drop in the bucket’, scholars warn