[Chungbuk] Budget to Respond to 'Low Births' Significantly Expanded... "Enhanced Marriage Support"

[Anchor]
Last year, Chungcheongbuk-do was the only metropolitan government in the country with an increase in the number of births.

Next year, we decided to make overcoming the population crisis a top priority and greatly increase the budget for responding to low birthrates.

This is reporter Lee Sung-woo.

[Reporter]
Last year, the number of births in Chungbuk increased by 128 from the previous year to 7,580.

It is the only metropolitan government in the country that has seen an increase in the number of births.

This year, the number of births by August was 5,014, a slight decrease from the same period last year.

In response, Chungcheongbuk-do raised 82.3 billion won, 36.5% more than this year, as a budget for responding to low birthrates next year.

With a significant increase in the budget, we have strengthened support throughout our lives, including marriage, pregnancy, and childcare.

In particular, to help unmarried men and women marry, public facilities in the region, such as Cheongnam University, are provided as wedding venues at a minimum cost,

We have decided to provide 2 million won for the wedding expenses to 100 couples who have a small wedding at a cost of 12 million won.

[Kim Soo-min / Chungcheongbuk-do Provincial Deputy Governor for Political Affairs: In addition, we will provide 2 million won in marriage support to newlyweds in areas where the population is decreasing from next year. We will first help desperate areas that are in danger of extinction due to poor settlement conditions.

The pregnancy and childbirth policy has also been strengthened, increasing the number of applications for infertility procedures from 25 per person to 25 per childbirth, and lowering the out-of-pocket rate to 30%.

The number of prenatal education travel support projects, which had a high response to pregnant women, increased from 300 to 900 next year.

In addition, as Chungbuk has the largest rate of twin births in the country, it will also pay 1.2 million won for baby formula for families with multiple births.

[Kim Young-hwan / Chungcheongbuk-do Governor: Not all policies are tied to overcoming the low birth rate, but all these welfare, education, housing, and youth issues are related to the low birth rate..]

Attention is focusing on the effectiveness of the policy on whether Chungcheongbuk-do's budget expansion related to low births will lead to a steady increase in the number of births.

I'm YTN's Lee Sungwoo.

Photographer
: Won Si-sik