SINGAPORE, Sept 23 — In around 10 years, Singapore could see more deaths than births among its citizens.

This population trend, if realised, would lead to a shrinking population without immigration, according to experts in population studies, according to a report from the Straits Times.

"Based on current trends, the number of citizen deaths could exceed the number of citizen births in the first half of the 2030s,” said Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) Indranee Rajah, in a written reply to a parliamentary question on September 9.

She was responding to Non-Constituency MP Hazel Poa, who had inquired about the number of citizen deaths over the past decade and when these figures might overtake births.

There were 24,726 citizen deaths in 2023, representing a 40 per cent increase from 17,691 in 2014.

In contrast, the number of citizen births declined. A PMO spokeswoman stated that there were 28,877 births in 2023, a 13 per cent drop from 33,193 in 2014.

According to the spokeswoman, citizen births refer to babies who are automatically granted Singaporean citizenship at birth if they have at least one Singaporean parent.

In her statement, Indranee said that the projections are illustrative, based on demographic assumptions such as fertility rates, migration and life expectancy, and that these assumptions may not materialise.

Countries like China, Japan and Italy, which have similarly low birth rates, are already experiencing more deaths than births, said academics interviewed for the report.

Agency for Science, Technology and Research Institute for Human Development and Potential’s Social Sciences director Professor Jean Yeung said that when a country’s fertility has been in decline for a long time, its population becomes older, and the number of deaths will naturally exceed the number of births.

Singapore’s resident total fertility rate has been declining for over 30 years and dropped below 1 to 0.97 in 2023 for the first time in the nation’s history.

The government has implemented measures to encourage higher birth rates over the past two decades, including offering Baby Bonus cash gifts, expanding maternity and paternity leave and extending government co-funding for in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatment for older women.

At the same time, Singapore’s population is ageing rapidly, with one in 10 Singaporeans aged 65 or older in 2010. By 2030, that number is expected to rise to one in four.

Institute of Policy Studies Senior Research Fellow Tan Poh Lin said the exact year when deaths surpass births is less critical than the speed of this demographic shift.

She noted that the rapid change in population size and workforce numbers would pose challenges for both the economy and society.

A shrinking population would affect sectors tied to domestic consumption, such as food, beverage, and retail, said Singapore University of Social Sciences labour economist Associate Professor Walter Theseira.

"It could be made up for to some extent with a non-resident migrant population and tourists, but the long-term drag is likely to be significant.

"It would be hard to imagine any sector that wouldn’t be negatively affected,” he told the Straits Times.

S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University’s head of the Social Cohesion Research Programme Leong Chan-Hoong said the growing older population could also place a greater tax burden on working-age adults.

This could raise concerns about the impact of immigration on racial identity and social cohesion, he added.

The Singapore government has been preparing for these demographic challenges, said Prof Yeung.

"That’s why a carefully calibrated number of immigrants have been added to Singapore’s population every year in the past decades,” she said.

According to the Population In Brief 2023 report, Singapore’s population grew by 5 per cent from 5.64 million in June 2022 to 5.92 million in June 2023.

The citizen population rose by 1.6 per cent to 3.61 million, while the permanent resident population increased by 3.7 per cent to 0.54 million during the same period.