Vietnam responds to the risk of aging population and labor crisis

Young people tend to marry late, have few children or do not want to have children, which is one of the factors causing Vietnam's population growth rate to decrease in recent years; at the same time, Vietnam is facing the risk of aging, losing its golden population, affecting socio-economic development.

The Ministry of Health is proposing intervention solutions to maintain the replacement fertility rate in Vietnam, preventing negative population growth. However, support measures to encourage having 2 children before the age of 35 applied in some localities have not changed the trend of late marriage and "reluctance" to have children among young people.

*Vietnam still has a lot to do to ensure sustainable population development. Independence*

Marry late, have few children or do not want to have children

According to the Department of Population (Ministry of Health), the current birth pattern of Vietnam is shifting from the highest birth rate in the age group of 20-24 to the age group of 25-29, at the same time, the age of marriage is increasing, the marriage rate is decreasing. This shows that the trend of late marriage, not wanting to get married, not wanting to have children, giving birth late, giving birth less, giving birth less frequently is increasing and tends to spread. An expert who has spent many years researching and participating in the work of building population policies, assessed that the trend of "being afraid to give birth, afraid to get married, delaying having children" is being affected by 4 groups of causes. In particular, the increasing urbanization process and economic development leading to the pressure of finding jobs , housing, living expenses, expensive costs of raising and caring for children are some of the factors affecting young couples, causing them to delay marriage and also affecting young women, they do not give birth or give birth to few children instead of giving birth to 2 - 2.1 children/woman (the replacement fertility rate that Vietnam needs to maintain).

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Concerned about aging population, Ministry of Health proposes right to decide number of children

In addition, Mr. Le Thanh Dung, Director of the Department of Population, said that other factors such as inadequate education infrastructure, health care and basic social services in industrial parks and economic zones also affect the decision to have children of young workers . In addition, for some groups of young people, when they have education, improved living conditions, trendy lifestyles and a hedonistic mentality have a certain impact on low birth rates. Or the situation of abortion in the private sector that is not strictly controlled can lead to infertility and affect the health of mothers and children. "In the draft Population Law drafted and completed by the Ministry of Health, "reducing gender imbalance at birth and bringing the sex ratio at birth to a natural balance" is one of the population policy groups included in the draft," said a member of the drafting committee.

Support "not strong enough"

According to the Ministry of Health, there are currently 21 provinces and cities with low birth rates (on average, each woman of childbearing age has less than 2 children (according to data in Decision 588/QD-TTg of the Prime Minister). These are localities that have applied measures to encourage giving birth to 2 children in areas with low birth rates in recent years.

Vietnam's fertility model has shifted from the highest fertility rate in the age group of 20-24 to the age group of 25-29, at the same time as the age of marriage increases and the marriage rate decreases.

Regarding the results of the "promoting birth" intervention in the above localities, Mr. Le Thanh Dung said that some provinces and cities have had policies to support and encourage women to give birth to 2 children before the age of 35, including financial or in-kind support; and one-time medical expense support when giving birth. "Although the reward amount is very small, it is an encouragement for individuals and couples to carry out the campaign for each family and couple to give birth to 2 children. Or the level of medical expense support is insignificant, but for women and low-income working families, that amount of money can partly support them when giving birth, when the need for family expenses increases while income decreases due to maternity leave... This is a stepping stone, a foundation for building and developing policies to support and encourage giving birth to 2 children," Mr. Dung assessed. However, regarding sustainable solutions to "promote birth" such as: support for buying social housing, priority for public school education and some other incentive policies for couples who have two children before the age of 35, as the Government's policy, Mr. Dung said: "Those are major policies, requiring the participation of the entire political system and large investment resources. The pilot interventions in low birth rate areas as requested by the Prime Minister are still in the process of review, research and development, and proposal, so they are not strong enough to raise the birth rate of provinces and cities in low birth rate areas."

Forecast of negative population growth risk

Answering the question that many people are interested in: "Why does Vietnam need a policy to encourage having 2 children, while in reality the population is still increasing?", the Director of the Department of Population said that studies and forecasts show a trend of decreasing birth rates in Vietnam. With this trend, in addition to the impact on population size, it also leads to a decrease in the proportion of children under 15 years old and an increase in the proportion of the elderly. Currently, Vietnam is still in the process of population aging and is one of the countries with the fastest aging rate in the world. Accordingly, when the birth rate decreases, it accelerates the aging process in our country. Thus, if the birth rate continues to decrease, the number of people born will decrease, the working-age population will decrease in the future, while the average life expectancy of Vietnamese people increases rapidly, leading to a very high proportion of the elderly population in the total population and Vietnam will have an aging population structure. "Therefore, birth control policies need to be adjusted promptly when birth rates tend to decrease. Currently, no country in the world has succeeded in bringing the birth rate back to replacement level when the total birth rate has decreased sharply. Therefore, Vietnam needs to focus on intervening immediately when there are signs of a large-scale decline in birth rates to avoid low birth rates," said Mr. Dung. Financial expert, Associate Professor, Dr. Ngo Tri Long also suggested that the Government should have more support policies to encourage people to have two children, such as support for renting houses and buying social housing (interest rate incentives). Or education and health policies to help them reduce pressure, prepare mentally and have conditions to proactively have children. If there is no solution soon, according to Mr. Long, we will face the risk of losing an abundant young labor force, will not be able to attract FDI enterprises, as well as large corporations in the world. Thus, the economy will face a labor crisis. Meanwhile, according to the draft Population Law, one of the groups of issues raised is the regulation on population size adjustment, fertility adjustment, implementation of replacement fertility maintenance, family planning and regulations on the number of children. According to the drafting committee, the adjustment of fertility must be associated with the requirement of reducing fertility in provinces and cities with high fertility, maintaining the results achieved in provinces and cities that have achieved replacement fertility, and increasing fertility in places with low fertility to achieve replacement fertility.

With the above basic objectives, the draft proposes 3 solutions, including a proposal to stipulate that couples and individuals have the right to decide on the time of childbirth, the number of children and the interval between births to ensure the responsibility of caring for and raising children well. According to the Population Department, this proposal has the advantage of avoiding the situation where the birth rate falls too low and cannot be recovered as some countries have faced. Experience from some countries in the world shows that when reaching the replacement level of birth rate, if birth control measures are slowly relaxed, the birth rate will drop very low, and no country has succeeded in bringing the birth rate to the replacement level. However, this solution also has limitations in that if there is no focus on propaganda and mobilization, it can easily lead to a sudden increase in the birth rate. It is estimated that the population size by 2030 will increase by 2 million people compared to the solution of continuing to implement family planning as it is now, affecting the average income index per capita and social security expenditure. Therefore, the draft also stipulates that couples and individuals have the obligation to implement population policies and laws and the Party and State's campaigns on population work appropriate to each period.

Population growth is slowing down

The average population growth rate in the period 2017 - 2020 is 1.07%. However, due to the slight decrease in fertility, the population growth rate has gradually decreased in recent years (the average population growth rate in 2022 is 0.98%, in 2023 is 0.84%) and is forecast to continue to decrease in the following years. According to the Vietnam Population Forecast 2019 - 2069 (General Statistics Office), in the case of a sharp decrease in fertility as in the low scenario, after 2054, Vietnam's population will begin to grow negatively and the population decline will become larger and larger. In the period 2054 - 2059, the average population decline is 0.04% per year, this decline at the end of the forecast period (2064 - 2069) is 0.18%, equivalent to an average decrease of 200,000 people/year. On the contrary, if the replacement fertility rate remains stable, Vietnam's population will increase slightly, with an average increase of 0.17% per year in the period 2064 - 2069, equivalent to 200,000 people/year. (Source: Department of Population, Ministry of Health)

Call for personal responsibility to have 2 children

In areas with low fertility rates, to increase fertility rates, in addition to the conditions of support and incentive policy solutions; creating an environment... for couples to have 2 children before the age of 35, the necessary condition is the responsibility of individuals and families for having 2 children. On the other hand, from the lessons learned from countries with low fertility rates today, when the replacement fertility rate has been reached, it is necessary and necessary to immediately and synchronously implement intervention solutions to prevent the fertility rate from falling or becoming too low. Therefore, effectiveness can only be achieved when there is correct awareness, correct solutions and the right time. According to the plan, the Ministry of Health will conduct a preliminary assessment of the period 2020 - 2025 to adjust it to suit the period 2026 - 2030. (Mr. Le Thanh Dung, Director of the Department of Population, Ministry of Health)

4 groups of intervention solutions in low fertility areas

Solutions in low birth rate areas currently focus on issuing policies and interventions to encourage young men and women to get married before the age of 30; support women who are pregnant, give birth and have 2 children before the age of 35 such as: 1. Support to create an environment for young men and women to socialize, make friends, date and get married. 2. Build an environment and community suitable for families with young children: pilot and expand worker-friendly services such as child pick-up and drop-off, babysitting, breast milk banks, family doctors, etc. 3. Support women during pregnancy and childbirth: infertility screening, prenatal and postnatal screening, malnutrition prevention; create conditions for women to return to work after giving birth; 4. Support and encourage couples to have 2 children: buy social housing, rent housing; give priority to public schools, support children's education costs; Building a model for managing and developing family economy; reducing personal income tax; exempting and reducing public contributions by household;... gradually piloting measures to increase social and community contribution responsibilities for individuals who do not want to get married or get married too late.

(Department of Population, Ministry of Health)

Source: https://thanhnien.vn/viet-nam-ung-pho-nguy-co-dan-so-gia-khung-hoang-lao-dong-185240710221927796.htm