Japan – Political Reactions to Japan’s Falling Birth Rate
Author: Womens UN Report Network
Date: July 22, 2005
Criticism
By CARL FREIRE
The Associated Press
Sunday, January 28,
2007; 8:50 AM
TOKYO — Japan’s health minister described women as “birth-giving machines”
in a speech on the falling birthrate, drawing criticism despite an immediate
apology.
“The number of women between the ages of 15 and 50 is fixed. The number of
birth-giving machines (and) devices is fixed, so all we can ask is that they do
their best per head,” Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Hakuo Yanagisawa said
in a speech Saturday, the Asahi and Mainichi newspapers reported.
Yanagisawa reportedly apologized even as he made the remarks, and later told
Kyodo News agency the language he used was “too uncivil.”
But Democratic Party leader Yukio Hatoyama was unmoved by his expression of
regret.
“It was extremely rude to women. Having children or not having children is
naturally a matter that women and households are free (to decide themselves),”
Hatoyama told reporters Sunday.
Japan’s population of 127 million contracted for the first time on record in
2005, mostly because of a drop in the birthrate, raising the prospect of severe
labor shortages and difficulties in paying health bills and pensions for large
numbers of elderly.
The country’s birthrate was 1.26 babies per woman in her lifetime in 2005, a
record low, and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has said his government wants to
develop measures to encourage more couples to have children.
A proposal adopted in June calls for increasing child care, promoting greater
gender equality, and encouraging companies to be more flexible in allowing staff
time to take care of family responsibilities.
But the high cost of raising children, as well as the lingering notion that
women should quit their jobs after giving birth, has meant many opt to have few
or no children.
Associated
Press
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