A new report has assessed that the unification of South and North Korea would slow down the aging of the Korean population.
 
The report on unification and aging was released by a researcher at the Bank of Korea’s institute on North Korean economy on Thursday.
 
The report said that compared to South Korea, North Korea has a high total fertility rate and has a large population aged between one and 14. The total fertility rate refers to the number of children who would be born per woman if she were to pass through the childbearing years bearing children according to a current schedule of age-specific fertility rates.

According to the report, South Korea’s population will become an aging society in 2017 and a super-aged society by 2026. However, the population of a unified Korea would not see an aging society until 2021 and a super-aged society until 2031.
 
The report said North Korea has a relatively young population, noting that as of 2015, the elderly take up only nine-and-a-half percent of the total population.
 
A nation is considered to have entered aging society if people aged 65 or over account for more than 14 percent of the total population. In a super-aged society, people in the age group take up more than 20 percent of the total population.