More childcare help key to more babies in Japan

TOKYO, June 10 9 (Reuters) Japanese women are willing to have more children if their husbands help with childcare chores, almost all of which are currently carried out by women, according to a survey.

Japan's fertility rate -- the average number of children a woman bears in her lifetime, fell to an all-time low of 1.25 in 2005. Demographers say a rate of 2.1 is needed to keep a population from declining.

According to a survey published yesterday of married women carried out by the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, 78 per cent of those of child-rearing age said they were responsible for 80 percent of the childcare.

Only 40 to 50 percent of husbands took on tasks such as nappy changing and lulling children to sleep, while 10 per cent of fathers with babies up to one year old didn't get involved in caring for them at all.

In couples where the husband did not do much childcare, only nine per cent of women said they wanted two more children, as opposed to 18 per cent of those whose husbands were highly involved in childcare, the survey found.

Japan's population declined last year for the first time since 1945. Experts had long predicted the shift, but it came two years earlier than forecast.

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