Russia’s latest move to combat low birth rates? Paying students to have kids – National

Almost a dozen regions in Russia are getting set to offer a cash payment to young women who give birth, Russian outlets are reporting, but there’s a pretty big catch.

According to the Moscow Times, monetary childbirth incentives will be offered in at least 11 Russian regions and will go into effect on Jan. 1, 2025. If a young woman successfully carries the child to term, they will be paid 100,000 rubles, or approximately C$1,300.

The bonuses, which were first announced in a handful of regions in the summer, come with strict criteria. While it varies by region, all require the mothers-to-be to be full-time students at a local college or university. Additionally, they must be under the age of 25 when they give birth.

The eligibility is also nullified if the mother fails to carry the child to term, meaning a stillborn baby would disqualify the woman from receiving payment.

Last month, Russia’s lower house of parliament voted unanimously to ban what authorities cast as dangerous propaganda for a child-free way of life, hoping to boost a faltering birth rate, reports Reuters.

Official data released in September put Russia’s birth rate at its lowest in a quarter of a century while mortality rates are up as Moscow’s war in Ukraine rages on and a wartime exodus sees citizens moving abroad. The Kremlin called the figures “catastrophic for the future of the nation.”

President Vladimir Putin has said that three-child families should be the norm in Russia in order to secure the future of the country.

The ban on child-free propaganda also includes any content deemed to promote “non-traditional lifestyles” such as same-sex relationships or gender fluidity, as well as dissenting accounts of the conflict in Ukraine. Violators can face large fines.

“We are talking about protecting citizens, primarily the younger generation, from information disseminated in the media space that has a negative impact on the formation of people’s personality,” said Vyacheslav Volodin, chairman of the lower house and a senior Putin ally, in November after the ban was announced.

“Everything must be done to ensure that new generations of our citizens grow up centred on traditional family values.”

In recent month, Russian lawmakers have made sweeping and panicked changes to health policy, as well as offering new cash incentives, in an attempt to course correct on low birth rates.

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The government has proposed using public funds to pay for newlywed wedding night stays at hotels, in the hopes they conceive, as well as encouraging women to use their breaks at work to have sex with the intention to get pregnant.

A regional health minister, Yevgeny Shestopalov, said on Russian TV in September that women should “engage in procreation on breaks.”

Per Newsweek, he added: “Being very busy at work is not a valid reason but a lame excuse. You can engage in procreation during breaks, because life flies by too quickly.”

And last year, Newsweek additionally reports, a member of Russia’s lower house suggested that female prisoners be released to procreate, with the hopes of increasing the nation’s birth rate, and their sentences be cancelled if they are successful in having a child.

The country’s health authority also announced expansion to fertility testing, with some women in Moscow reporting having received unsolicited referrals to testing clinics.

Russia isn’t the only country grappling with low birth rates. According to Statistics Canada report released in September, the Canadian fertility rate in 2023 was 1.26 children per woman, which is the lowest recorded level since the agency began collecting data.

A StatCan report published in January said Canada, like other countries, is riding the “fertility ‘pandemic rollercoaster’” with more families putting off having children.

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