Editing Demographics of North Korea (section)

==Size and growth rate==
In their 1992 monograph, ''The Population of North Korea'', Eberstadt and Banister use the data given to the UNFPA and make their own assessments.<ref name=":1" /> They place the total population at 21.4 million persons in mid-1990, consisting of 10.6 million males and 10.8 million females.<ref name=":1" />{{sfn|Eberstadt|Banister|1992|p=xiii}} This figure is close to an estimate of 21.9 million persons for mid-1988 cited in the 1990 edition of the ''Demographic Yearbook'' published by the UN.<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{Cite book|title=Demographic Yearbook|publisher=United Nations|date=1990}}</ref> ''Korean Review'', a book by Pang Hwan-ju published by the [[Foreign Languages Publishing House (North Korea)|Foreign Languages Publishing House]] in 1987, gives a figure of 19.1 million persons for 1986.<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{Cite book|author=Pang Hwan Ju|title=Korean Review|location=Pyongyang|publisher=[[Foreign Languages Publishing House (North Korea)|Foreign Languages Publishing House]]|date=1987|oclc=247384226}}</ref>

===Male-female ratio===
[[File:Korean lady in Pyongyang.jpg|thumb|Korean woman walking in Pyongyang]]
The figures disclosed by the government reveal an unusually low proportion of males to females: in 1980 and 1987, the male-to-female ratios were 86.2 to 100, and 84.2 to 100, respectively.<ref name=":1" /> Low male-to-female ratios are usually the result of a war, but these figures were lower than the sex ratio of 88.3 males per 100 females recorded for 1953, the last year of the [[Korean War]].<ref name=":1" /> The male-to-female ratio would be expected to rise to a normal level with the passage of years, as happened between 1953 and 1970, when the figure was 95.1 males per 100 females.<ref name=":1" /> After 1970, however, the ratio declined. Eberstadt and Banister suggest that before 1970 male and female population figures included the whole population, yielding ratios in the ninetieth percentile, but that after that time the male military population was excluded from population figures.<ref name=":1" />

Based on the figures provided by the Central Statistics Bureau, Eberstadt and Banister estimate that the actual size of the "hidden" male North Korean military had reached 1.2 million by 1986 and that the actual male-to-female ratio was 97.1 males to 100 females in 1990.<ref name=":2">{{Harvnb|Savada|1994|p=57}}.</ref> If their estimates are correct, 6.1 percent of North Korea's total population was in [[Korean People's Army|the military]],<ref name=":2" /> numerically the world's [[List of countries by number of active troops|fourth largest active military force]] as of 2021.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Routley |first1=Nick |title=Mapped: All the World's Military Personnel |url=https://www.visualcapitalist.com/mapped-all-the-worlds-military-personnel/ |website=Visual Capitalist |access-date=21 May 2022 |date=11 March 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Hackett |first1=James |title=The military balance 2021 |date=2021 |publisher=The International Institute for Strategic Studies |location=Abingdon, Oxon |isbn=978-1-032-01227-8}}</ref>

A survey in 2017 found that the famine had skewed North Korea's demography, impacting particularly on male infants. Women aged 20–24 made up 4% of the population, while men in the same age group made up only 2.5%.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-unicef/tackling-north-koreas-chronically-poor-sewage-not-rocket-science-u-n-idUSKBN1JG2Q4|title=Tackling North Korea's chronically poor sewage 'not rocket science': U.N.|first=Tom|last=Miles|work=[[Reuters]]|date=21 June 2018}}</ref>

===Growth rate===
The annual population growth rate in 1960 was 2.7 percent, rising to a high of 3.6 percent in 1970, and falling to 1.9 percent in 1975.<ref name=":2" /> This fall reflected a dramatic decline in the fertility rate: the average number of children born to women decreased from 6.5 in 1966 to 2.5 in 1988.<ref name=":2" /> Assuming the data is reliable, reasons for falling growth rates and fertility rates probably include late marriage, [[urbanization]], limited housing space, and the expectation that women would participate equally in work hours in the labor force.<ref name=":2" /> The experience of other socialist countries suggests that widespread labor force participation by women often goes hand-in-hand with more traditional role expectations; in other words, they are still responsible for housework and childrearing.<ref name=":2" /> The high percentage of males age 17 to 26 may have contributed to the low [[fertility]] rate.<ref name=":2" />

According to Eberstadt and Banister's data, the annual [[population growth]] rate in 1991 was 1.9 percent.<ref name=":2" /> However, the CIA ''World Factbook'' estimated that North Korea's annual population growth rate was 1.0% in 1991 and that it has since declined to 0.4% by 2009.<ref name="CIA 2016"/>

===Promoting population growth===
The North Korean government seems to perceive its population as too small in relation to that of South Korea.<ref name=":2" /> In its public pronouncements, Pyongyang has called for accelerated population growth and encouraged large families.<ref name=":2" /> According to one [[Korean American]] scholar who visited North Korea in the early 1980s, the country has no birth control policies; parents are encouraged to have as many as six children.<ref name=":2" /> The state provides ''tagaso'' (nurseries) to lessen the burden of childrearing for parents and offers a 77-day paid leave after childbirth.<ref name=":2" />

Eberstadt and Banister suggest, however, that authorities at the local level make [[contraceptive]] information readily available to parents and that intrauterine devices are the most commonly adopted birth control method.<ref name=":2" /> An interview with a former North Korean resident in the early 1990s revealed that such devices are distributed free at clinics.<ref name=":2" />