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In 2021, there were **** births per 1,000 people in Northern Ireland, compared with eleven in the previous year. Between 2000 and 2008, Northern Ireland's birth rate increased from **** to **** but started to decline gradually until 2012 when it dropped from **** to **** in just one year. During this provided time period, the birth rate in Northern Ireland was highest in 1971, when it was **** and was at its lowest in 2020 when there were just eleven births per 1,000 people.

Falling birth rates in the UK

For the United Kingdom as a whole, the birth rate fell to **** births per 1,000 people in 2020, before a slight uptick to **** in 2021. After a postwar peak of **** births per 1,000 people in 1964, the UK birth rate fell sharply to just **** by 1977. Between 1977 and 2012 the birth rate fluctuated between **** and ****, but declined in every year between 2012 and 2020. In 2021, the UK's fertility rate (the number of births per women) fell to just ****, compared with **** in 1964. Since 1973, the UK has fallen below the minimum replacement level fertility rate of ***, and without immigration would likely see its population decline in the long term.

Global demographic trends

The considerable decline in the UK's fertility rate in recent decades is not an isolated phenomenon. As of 2025, Africa was, at ****, the only continent to have a fertility rate higher than the global average of ****.ÌýSeveral countries, mainly in East Asia and Europe, have far lower fertility rates than the UK or the global average, however. South Korea provides the most dramatic example of this trend, with its fertility rate falling from **** in 1960 to just **** by 2020. By the , it is expected that, as Africa's fertility rate converges with the rest of the world, the global population will peak at around **** billion and start to decline.