BEIJING: China’s birth rate fell last year to its lowest level on record, official data showed Monday, as its population shrank for a fourth year running despite authorities’ efforts to curb the decline.

There were just 7.92 million births recorded last year, Chinese officials said Monday, a rate of 5.63 births per thousand people.

It marks the lowest birth rate since records by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) began in 1949 — the year Communist leader Mao Zedong declared the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

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Beijing has scrambled to boost marriage and fertility rates, offering childcare subsidies and taxing condoms as it grapples with a rapidly aging population.

China’s birth rate had declined consistently over the last decade, despite the end of the restrictive “one-child policy”, until a slight uptick in 2024 when 6.77 births were recorded per thousand.

The previous low was in 2023, when China recorded 9.02 million births — a rate of 6.39 per 1,000 people.

Marriage rates are also at record low levels, with many young couples put off having babies by high child-rearing costs and career concerns.

Meanwhile China recorded 11.31 million deaths in 2025, a mortality rate of 8.04 per thousand — leading to a population decline of 2.41 per thousand, NBS data showed.