Canada’s fertility rate has reached a new low

A couple pushes a stroller through Fall leaves at Trinity Bellwoods Park, Toronto, Thursday, October 28, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Eduardo Lima

Canada’s total fertility rate fell again last year, reaching a record low of 1.25 children per woman, following years of decline.

Published Wednesday, new data from Statistics Canada show the birth rate slipping 1.6 per cent from 2023; the first year that fertility rates fell below 1.3 children per woman.

Countries below that threshold, now including Canada alongside Switzerland, Luxembourg, Finland, Italy, Japan, Singapore and South Korea, are considered to have “ultra-low fertility,” the agency notes.

Decades of decline

Canada’s fertility rate has fallen for decades, from a peak of nearly four children per woman in the late 1950s.

A 2024 report from Statistics Canada notes that some of the steepest drops in fertility came during the “baby bust,” roughly between 1960 and 1975, as access to medical contraception and abortion grew across the country.

Other impactful periods include the Great Depression and Second World War, which respectively decreased, then increased birth rates, as well as the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, when fertility briefly jumped before resuming its yearslong decline.

In 1972, Canada’s fertility rate fell below the threshold of 2.1 children per woman, commonly referred to as “replacement fertility,” or the minimum rate required to maintain a stable population through births alone.

In an interview with CTV News last year, social demographer Kate Choi of Western University noted that an increasingly competitive economy has driven men and women alike to prioritize their education and delay parenthood until they have more stable living circumstances.

“Often, young individuals and couples may want to delay fertility (until) after they have a down payment for a home, or they have a suitable and secure place to raise their children,” she said.

“While there is a normative change towards low fertility, it’s also the case that there are a lot of economic barriers that are resulting in delayed and forgone fertility.”

Canada’s average childbearing age among mothers has risen steadily for decades, reaching an all-time high of 31.8 years in 2024, up 19 per cent from 26.7 in 1976.

Global fertility

Declining fertility is affecting a wide swath of the global population, with member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) alone seeing their rates halved on average in the past six decades, to 1.5 from 3.3 children per woman in 1960.

A 2024 report from the organization warns that the decline “will change the face of societies, communities and families,” as well as risk a “significant impact on economic growth and prosperity.”

As for the reason behind the decline, data from a United Nations survey released in June found “financial limitations” to be the most commonly reported reason to have fewer children than planned, followed by constraints on employment, housing and child-care, alongside health and health-care-related obstacles.

“Every country surveyed had significant proportions of people who reported having to revise their intended family size,” the survey report reads. “Everywhere we look, people are struggling to freely realize their reproductive aspirations.”

Under the shadow of climate change, the aftereffects of a global pandemic and increasing economic instability, the OECD report notes that the transition into parenthood has grown “complicate(d)” for many.

Tackling that uncertainty is key to reversing the decline, the organization notes, highlighting policy solutions like parental leave and affordable child care to help parents maintain their careers while also growing their families.

“Facilitating parenthood decisions requires comprehensive and reliable support to families,” said OECD department director Stefano Scarpetta, in a release.

“This includes affordable housing, family policies that help reconcile work and family life, and coherence with other public policies that promote access to quality jobs and career progression of women.”