Cypriots offered cash lure to have 3 children

NICOSIA, Feb 16 (Reuters) Cyprus may offer parents 20,000 Cyprus pounds (45,500 dollars) to have a third child in an effort to counter a falling birth rate.

Many Cypriot families stop at two children for which they are granted a tax allowance of 500 pounds a year.

''It's part of a broad package of measures we are proposing to deal with the low birth rate,'' Labour Minister Antonis Vassiliou, who is a gynaecologist, said yesterday.

Cyprus's birth rate is 1.4 per cent, well below the 2.10 percent replenishment rate.

One mother said, cash or no cash, her nappy-changing days were over.

''Children cost money and I don't think the amount they are offering equals the cost,'' said 35-year-old office worker Eleni Stylianou, a mother of two.

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