South Korea’s statistics agency said Wednesday that 238,300 babies were born last year, an increase of 8,300 from a year earlier. It said the country’s fertility rate — the average number of babies born to each woman in their reproductive years — was 0.75 in 2024, up from 0.72 in 2023.

The vice chairman of a government committee on aging perceives the ‘rebound as an important step to reverse the long-term trend’ in which the low