Debated in Parliament on 1 Mar 2024.
Ms Ng Ling Ling asked the Prime Minister in each of the past three years, what is the proportion of annual births from women who are (i) 30 years old and below (ii) between 31 and 35 years old and (iii) 36 years old and above, respectively.
In 2021 and 2022, around 33% of total live births were from women aged 30 years old and below. Around 44% were from women between 31 and 35 years old, and around 23% were from those 36 years old and above. Figures for 2023 are still being finalised.
The information is published annually in the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority's (ICA's) Report on the Registration on Births and Deaths, which contains key demographic statistics, including total live births by age of mother. The report is available on ICA's website.
Ms Ng Ling Ling.
Speaker, I thank the Minister for the reply. I am referring to the higher proportion of women who are giving birth between the ages of 31 and 35. From my conversations with some of these women, they are not aware that their fertility health get challenged during that period and sometimes there can be complications.
So, I wanted to ask one supplementary question. Given our low total fertility rate (TFR), will the Ministry consider investing in more longitudinal research and studies on young Singaporean women's awareness, attitudes and considerations towards fertility health and childbirth, so that we can proactively find interventions along the way to mitigate the declining TFR?
Minister, a short reply please.
Mr Speaker, I just need to clarify the first part of Ms Ng's question about longitudinal studies. Could the Member just repeat that?
Yes, I wanted to check if the Ministry will consider investing in the longitudinal studies to understand young Singaporean women's awareness, attitudes and considerations towards fertility health and childbirth.
We can certainly look at those studies, but what is happening at the moment is a global phenomenon where, across the world, women are either choosing not to get married or deferring having children after they get married.
If you look deeper into this, a lot of it has to do with the opportunity cost as well as the sense of wanting to be able to achieve certain milestones. In the past, the first milestone was to get married and have children. Now, there is a sense of "I need to achieve a career milestone", "I need to be able to travel and visit this country", "I want to be able to achieve other things" and then, marriage and children come further down along the line.
These are personal choices, personal decisions. We have to see what we can do to encourage it and make it easier for people to get married and have children. And that was the focus of my speech in the Committee of Supply, looking at all of the various factors which operate in people's minds before they decide to get married and have children. So, fundamentally, we have got to move towards a society that supports family formation and parenthood.
Mr Louis Ng, with regard to your Question No 10, I will get the Ministry to give you a written reply.
Order. End of Question Time. The Clerk will now proceed to read the Orders of the day.
[Pursuant to Standing Order No 22(3), provided that Members had not asked for questions standing in their names to be postponed to a later Sitting day or withdrawn, written answers to questions not reached by the end of Question Time are reproduced in the Appendix.]
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