SEOUL, May 28 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's births grew for the ninth straight month amid a continued population fall, statistical office data showed Wednesday.
The number of newborn babies advanced 6.8 percent from a year earlier to 21,041 in March, continuing to increase since July last year, according to Statistics Korea.
The total fertility rate, or the number of children a woman is expected to bear during life, added 0.04 to 0.77 in the cited month, but it stayed far below the replacement rate of 2.1 births per woman to maintain a stable population.
Concerns remained about the younger generation who delayed or gave up on having children owing to economic difficulties such as high housing prices and stubborn unemployment.
The still low birth rate fueled worry about a demographic cliff, which refers to a sharp fall in the heads of households, eventually leading to a consumption cliff.
The number of marriages expanded 11.5 percent to 19,181 in March on a yearly basis, while the number of divorces reduced 3.2 percent to 7,210.
The number of deaths inched up 0.2 percent to 31,141 in March compared to the same month of last year.
Affected by higher deaths and still low births, the natural population decline reached 10,100 in the cited month. ■