With the growing number of single person households, the number of meal kit products for single person households has increased dramatically. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Jan. 4 (Korea Bizwire) – The number of single-person households increased further last year to account for a record high of 42 percent of all households, data from the interior ministry showed Thursday.
According to the resident registration data from the ministry, the total number of registered households in the country rose by 0.9 percent to reach 23.91 million as of December last year, compared to the previous year when the corresponding figure was 23.7 million.
Of the total, one-person households reached 9.93 million as of last month, up from 9.72 million compared to a year ago, accounting for the majority of the yearly growth in the total number of households.
The recent growth elevated the proportion of one-person households in the total households to 42 percent, a significant increase from last year’s estimated ratio of one-person families of 34 percent, as reported by Statistics Korea, the national statistics agency.
The ministry compiles the one-person household data based on the address, offering a more accurate representation of individuals living alone. In contrast, the statistics agency’s data is family-based, counting, for instance, a family of three members, all living separately, as a single family.
According to the ministry data, two-person households reached 5.86 million last month, up slightly from 5.74 million from a year ago. Three-person households also grew slightly from 4.01 million to 4.02 million.
Both four-person and five-person households, however, shrank to 3.14 million and 743,232 last month from 3.25 million and 776,259 from a year earlier, respectively.
The average number of members per household also slightly decreased to 2.15 from 2.17.
As of December, the capital Seoul and the populous surrounding province of Gyeonggi together hosted 44 percent of all households, with each having 4.46 million and 5.97 million registered households, respectively.
“A continued increase in unmarried people and seniors living alone appears to have brought the proportion of the one-person households to over 40 percent,” a ministry official said.
(Yonhap)
