In 2023, Japan recorded 758,631 births. That was down 5.1% on the year and a record low, almost matching the 755,000 that the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research had not expected until 2035. The same year, marriages fell below 500,000 for the first time since the 1930s.
The Children and Families Agency was set up against that backdrop. It began operating on April 1, 2023, and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida welcomed its staff at a launch ceremony on April 3. “Each and every child is precious,” he told them, and he described the agency’s mission as building a society “in which the interests of children take center stage.”
What Kishida asked of the agency
Kishida said the way to get there was to listen to children, take what they say seriously and turn it into concrete policy. He told officials to work from the principle of “valuing your opinions and considering and formulating policies together with you.”
He also warned of a “pile of challenges” in policy on children and child-rearing, and asked staff to spend time in real settings and hear from children and from the people raising them. The agency draws its staff from national and local government and from the public sector. Kishida urged them to use that mix to work closely together.
He had a request on working conditions as well. Officials should be the first to show that both parents can work and still raise children, he said, with male officials taking childcare leave, proper rest between shifts and more telework and paperless work.
Turning to marriage
By July 2024 the agency was looking at why people were not marrying. The Guardian reported that it held its first working group meeting on a Friday that month, aimed at helping young people find partners through dating, matchmaking and other means. Those attending included people considering marriage and experts on the problems younger people face.
Ayuko Kato, the minister of state for policies related to children, told the gathering that marriage and child-rearing should rest on respect for people’s diverse values. “We would be grateful if we could hear your real voices,” she said, “what you are thinking, what is preventing you from making your wishes come true.”
The agency cited a survey of single people aged 25 to 34. In 2021, 43.3% of men and 48.1% of women said they had no opportunity to meet potential partners. Many had done nothing to improve their chances, such as going to matchmaking events or asking friends for introductions.
Few children are born to unmarried parents in Japan, so the fall in marriages is widely cited as a main reason for the low birthrate. Surveys point to the high cost of living in big cities, a shortage of good jobs and a work culture that makes it hard for women to return to full-time work after having children. Economist Takashi Kadokura wrote on a Yahoo Japan news blog that local government efforts to promote marriage were not working, because more workers were on non-regular contracts and found it too costly to start a family.
Sources
- Launch Ceremony of the Children and Families Agency (The Prime Minister in Action) | Prime Minister's Office of Japan
- Japan asks young people why they are not marrying amid population crisis | Japan | The Guardian
