The number of marriages between South Koreans and foreign partners stood at 26,948 in 2013. (image: Kobizmedia/Korea Bizwire)
SEOUL, Nov. 20 (Korea Bizwire) – The rate of marriage and divorce among multiracial families has decreased. The birth rate for them has declined as well.
The number of marriages between South Koreans and foreign partners stood at 26,948 in 2013, down 7.8 percent compared with the previous year, according to a study called the “Multicultural Family Statistics 2013” conducted by the National Statistical Office. The number has continuously fallen from 36,629 in 2008 to 35,098 in 2010 to 29,224 in 2012.
Men of a multinational couple got married at the age of 35.5 on average while women of the couple usually got married at the age of 27.2, which makes the gap of 8.3 years. The age gap between the couple has also fallen from 9.5 years in 2011 to 8.3 years in 2013.
In case of divorce, the number between global couples represented 13,482, down by 1.6 percent from 13,701 of the previous year. The average age of men when they got divorced was 47.2 years while that of women was 37.4 years. They lived together for 5.8 years on average in 2013 before getting divorced, longer than 5.4 years in 2012 and 4.9 years in 2011.
In terms of nationality, 74.8 percent of male spouses were Korean, followed by Chinese (11.4%), Japanese (8.9%) and American (1.9%). In contrast, 45.5 percent of female spouses were from China, followed by Vietnam (19.8%), Korea (19.6%), the Philippines (4.3%), Japan (2.0%) and Cambodia (1.5%).
The number of births for global couples stood at 21,290 in 2013, down by 1,618, equivalent to 7.1 percent, from 22,908 of the previous year. Of the total newborn babies in Korea, the percentage of multinational babies amounted to 4.9 percent.
By Veronica Huh (veronicah@koreabizwire.com)
