askST: What is total fertility rate? What does Singapore’s record low rate mean?

SINGAPORE – The fertility rate in Singapore dropped to a new low in 2025, deepening concerns about how the double whammy of falling number of births and a rapidly ageing population would reshape society and the economy.

The resident total fertility rate (TFR), which refers to the average number of babies each woman would have during her reproductive years, fell from 0.97 in 2024 to the preliminary figure of 0.87 in 2025.

The TFR was 1.24 in 2015.

Even 2024, a Year of the Dragon in the Chinese zodiac which traditionally sees a bump in birth rates,

failed to lift the TFR.

It remained the same as in 2023 – the first time Singapore’s TFR fell below 1.

Deputy Prime Minister Gan Kim Yong, speaking during the debate on the budget for the Prime Minister’s Office on Feb 26, said that with birth rates falling at an unprecedented pace,

Singapore’s citizen population may start to shrink by the early 2040s

without new interventions.

DPM Gan added that the falling number of births and rapidly ageing population have wide-ranging implications, from weakening family support networks to slowing economic growth. He also stressed the need to have a “carefully managed immigration flow to augment our low birth rate”.

The Straits Times examines the nuts and bolts of TFR, and why it matters.

The TFR is the average number of babies a woman is expected to have during her reproductive years, which are defined as between 15 and 49 years of age. It is calculated using the age-specific fertility rate (ASFR) for a given year.

The ASFR measures the number of babies born to women in a specific age group per 1,000 women in that same group.

The TFR is calculated by adding up the ASFRs for women in each five-year age group – from 15 to 19 up to 45 to 49.

The total is then multiplied by five and divided by 1,000.

If the TFR remains at 0.87, this would translate to just 44 children and 19 grandchildren for every 100 residents today, DPM Gan explained.

“Over time, it will be practically impossible to reverse the trend because we will have fewer and fewer women who can bear children,” he said.

Professor Jean Yeung, director of social sciences at the A*STAR Institute for Human Development and Potential, cautioned that without “substantial” numbers of immigration, Singapore’s population would age rapidly and eventually shrink, as each generation would be substantially smaller than the one before.

Even with the 2025 TFR of 0.87 and current levels of immigration, the percentage of seniors aged 65 and older would rise from 20.7 per cent in 2025 to about 26 per cent to 29 per cent in 2050.

On the other hand, the percentage of people who are of working age would start to decline in the mid-2030s, said Prof Yeung, who is also from the department of paediatrics at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore.

This means there will be fewer people of working age supporting each senior in the population, and a smaller proportion of the population paying taxes.

This would lead to greater fiscal pressures for Singapore, unless there is an increase in the number of immigrants or labour productivity, Prof Yeung explained.

The replacement rate is the level of fertility at which a population replaces itself from one generation to the next without relying on immigration. Globally, the rate is estimated to be around 2.1 births per woman.

Dr Tan Poh Lin, a senior research fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies, said that if every woman has two children in her lifetime, she would “replace” herself and her husband.

However, the replacement rate is set at 2.1 instead of 2 to account for the possibility that some children, either male or female, may die before having children.

Another reason is that more boys are born than girls, said Prof Yeung. Globally, about 105 boys are born for every 100 girls. That means roughly 48.8 per cent of babies are female.

Since only daughters can replace mothers demographically, slightly more than two babies per woman are needed to ensure one surviving daughter per woman.

Singapore has one of the lowest TFRs in the world – 0.87 in 2025.

South Korea recorded the world’s lowest TFR in 2023 at 0.72, but it rose for two consecutive years to 0.8 in 2025, according to preliminary data.

In Hong Kong, the TFR was 0.84 in 2024.

Most developed countries have higher fertility rates than Singapore’s. For example, in 2024, the TFR was 1.15 in Japan, 1.48 in Australia, 1.6 in the United States, and 1.62 in France.

Dr Tan said it makes sense to compare Singapore with other cities, rather than with entire countries, due to factors such as housing costs, income levels, and access to community support and formal care.

She noted that rural regions generally have higher TFRs than cities, due to reasons such as lower costs of living, cultural differences, and the fact that children are more likely to help with farm work and other rural activities.

The TFR and the crude birth rate measure different things.

The crude birth rate counts the total number of babies born per 1,000 people in a specific year.

The TFR looks at the average number of children a woman would have over her reproductive years.

Prof Yeung said that in rapidly ageing societies such as Singapore, the TFR is the more appropriate indicator used for long-term planning purposes, such as estimating how many immigrants are needed to reach a certain population size or predicting when the population would start to decline.

The crude birth rate is more relevant for short-term planning, such as estimating how much in Baby Bonus incentives the Government has to spend over the next few years or the number of teachers needed.

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