China’s Chongqing to remove marriage requirement for maternity benefits

Chongqing, a sprawling municipality in southwest China, announced this week that insured residents no longer need to provide marriage certificates to get maternity benefits, the most recent move to encourage women to have children.
The city’s medical security authority announced on its official WeChat social media account that the changes take effect on Friday.
The measure comes as authorities across the country grapple with how to boost China’s flagging birth rate after the country’s first population drop in six decades.
China’s southwest Guizhou province, northwest Shaanxi province, southern Hunan province and Jiangsu province in the east of the country have also removed restrictions for women to be married to obtain childbirth subsidies.
Marriage rates, which hit a record low in 2022 at 6.8 million, the lowest since 1986, are closely twinned with the number of newborns – due to official policies which have made it hard for single women to have children.