During the National Mothers' Meeting on Dec. 3 in Pyongyang, he exhorted women to have more children while dabbing his eyes with a handkerchief. Kim told the thousands of women at the meeting that reversing North Korea's declining birth rate was a duty they must do to strengthen national power.
"Preventing a decline in birth rates and good childcare are all of our housekeeping duties we need to handle while working with mothers," said the North Korean leader. "We are confronted with a host of social tasks that [our] mothers should join to tackle."
"These tasks include bringing up their children so that they will steadfastly carry forward our revolution; eliminating the recently increasing non-socialist policies; promoting family harmony and social unity; establishing a sound way of cultural and moral life; making the communist virtues and traits of helping and leading one another forward prevail over our society; stopping the declining birth rate; and taking good care of children and educating them effectively. These belong to our common family affairs, which we need to deal with by joining hands with our mothers."
Kim also exhorted mothers to instill the values of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) in their children. He continued that "in view of our mothers' position and role in their families and society," the North Korean government viewed the Dec. 3 gathering of mothers as "no less important than a [WPK] congress or a plenary meeting of the [WPK] Central Committee."
Many of the women present in the meeting, all dressed in traditional multi-colored Korean garb, openly wept along with Kim. However, pictures released by the Korean Central News Agency showed a jolly side of the event, with the adoring crowd clapping and cheering Kim as he waved back from his seat. The North Korean leader was flanked by male officials in suits and military uniforms.
Russia's Putin also calls for more kids to replenish war casualties
The National Mothers' Meeting, the first in 11 years, was organized amid a drop in the hermit kingdom's birth rate. This prompted concern among top officials in North Korea, formally the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK).
Getting detailed population numbers from North Korea is extremely difficult due to the limited statistics it releases to the outside world. Pyongyang's last census in 2008 puts its population at 24 million. Estimates 15 years later now put this number at 25.7 million, but this could decrease to 23.7 million by 2070.
South Korea disagrees, however, stating that the DPRK's fertility rate has declined steadily for the past 10 years. According to Statistics Korea, the fertility rate – the average number of babies expected to be born to a woman over her lifetime – was 1.79 in 2022. Eight years prior, it was 1.88.
Incidentally, Kim's message to North Korean mothers came days after Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a similar encouragement to Russian women. According to the Daily Express, Putin explained that having more children was necessary to prevent "catastrophic demographic problems" that could impact Russia's economy down the line.
"Many of our people maintain the tradition of the family where four, five, or more children are raised. Recall that in Russian families, our grandmothers and great-grandmothers had both seven and eight children. Let us preserve and revive these traditions," said Putin. (Related: Replenishing the population: Putin wants Russian women to have MORE CHILDREN to replace war casualties.)
"Having many children, [and] a large family, should become a norm, a way of life for all the people of Russia. A family is not just the foundation for the state and society. It is a spiritual phenomenon, the source of morality."
Visit PopulationCollapse.com for more stories about declining populations in North Korea and other countries.
Watch this video that discusses the free-fall of fertility rates and population numbers since the 1970s.
This video is from the Crrow777 Radio channel on Brighteon.com.
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