According to official data, after years of rising, the number of registered divorces declined for the first time in 2020. Through data comparison, CBN found that the number of divorce registrations in the first quarter of 2021 dropped by more than 70%, with only 296,000 pairs. According to the data of various provinces, the number of divorces in Sichuan, Henan and Guangdong ranked in the top three in the first quarter.
It should be noted that, compared with marriage registration, there are two ways of divorce: civil affairs department registration divorce, court judgment and mediation divorce. What is counted here is the data of civil affairs department registration divorce, which is the main body of the total number of divorces.
The number of divorces in the first quarter was only 296,000 couples.
According to the latest data released by the Ministry of Civil Affairs, in the first quarter of this year, the number of registered divorces nationwide was only 296,000.
According to the first financial reporter, the number of registered divorces in the fourth quarter of last year was 1.063 million pairs. Therefore, from the ring comparison, the number of registered divorces in the first quarter of this year decreased by 72.15%. On a year-on-year basis, due to the influence of epidemic factors in the first quarter of 2020, the data is not comparable, so compare it with the first quarter of 2019; In the first quarter of 2019, the number of registered divorces was 1.048 million, a decrease of 71.76% in the first quarter of this year compared with two years ago.
Professor Dong Yuzheng, a population expert and president of Guangdong Population Development Research Institute, analyzed the First Financial Report and found that there are many reasons for the decline in the number of divorces, one of which is the implementation of the cooling-off period system for divorce.
In order to implement the cooling-off period system for divorce in People’s Republic of China (PRC) Civil Code, which came into effect on January 1, 2021, the Ministry of Civil Affairs adjusted the marriage registration procedure and added a "cooling-off period for divorce" to the divorce procedure. Within 30 days after the expiration of the cooling-off period for divorce, if both parties fail to jointly apply to the marriage registration office for a divorce certificate, the application for divorce registration shall be deemed to have been withdrawn.
Dong Yuzheng analysis, the implementation of the divorce cooling-off period system, so that both parties to the marriage and their families, relatives and friends and other related personnel are calm down, maybe we can find a chance not to divorce, or divorce more rationally and firmly. In this way, some impulsive divorces may turn into more rational divorces or interrupt the divorce process. "The advantage of this is to turn the original divorce based on emotional outbursts, irrationality and excessive self-demand into a divorce that respects each other, considers the children and the future. Since the three views are inconsistent and intolerant of each other, we can’t go on together, so it’s good to get together. "
"The implementation of the cooling-off period system for divorce can free many people from the relatively one-sided thinking and behavior of only looking at each other’s shortcomings in the past period of time, and become a more comprehensive and dialectical view of each other and themselves. Even if you really want to divorce, you don’t have to be enemies or enemies, but remember each other’s past, become familiar people and become friends. It is definitely better to have such a system than not to have such a system. " Dong Yuzheng said.
From the practical operation, there are quite a few people who withdraw or give up divorce registration in various places. For example, in Jiangsu, after the cooling-off period was added in the divorce procedure on January 1 this year, as of April 15, 10303 couples who applied for divorce in Jiangsu had given up registration.
In Wuhan, in January this year, Wuhan accepted a total of 3,096 divorce applications. As of March 5, the first batch of divorce registration was 1,309 couples/month, and about 58% of couples gave up registration after applying. In Nanchang, as of April 12 this year, 4,796 couples applied for divorce registration in Nanchang, and 1,621 couples successfully divorced, and 718 couples applied for divorce registration were cancelled, of which 42 couples voluntarily cancelled and 676 couples voluntarily gave up after expiration.
Besides the cooling-off period of divorce, there are other factors. Dong Yuzheng said that from the age structure, many people who are divorced now are married in recent years, but the total number of married people has dropped rapidly in recent years. Many people who got married in recent years were born in the 1990s, when the birth population continued to decline under the family planning policy. When these people get married, of course, the total number of people who get married is also decreasing.
In 2020, China’s marriage registration data was 8.131 million pairs. This is the second time that it has fallen below the 9 million mark after falling below the 10 million mark in 2019. This is also the lowest since 2003, only 60% of the peak in 2013. In the first quarter of this year, the number of married couples nationwide was only 2.132 million, a decrease of 24.3% compared with the first quarter of 2019 (2.815 million couples) two years ago.
However, on the whole, the number of divorces dropped sharply in the first quarter, which is inevitable, but there are also some structural factors. In particular, many divorced couples "automatically" withdrew their divorce applications, but it doesn’t mean that they will give up their divorce. On the whole, there will be a delay effect, and the real effect of the divorce cooling-off period system will take longer to test.
Sichuan has the largest number of divorces.
Regionally, there are 12 provinces with more than 10,000 couples registered for divorce, among which the top ten provinces are Sichuan, Henan, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Shandong, Anhui, Hubei, Hunan, Guizhou and Chongqing. Among them, Sichuan ranks first with 23,995 pairs, Henan ranks second with 22,049 pairs, and Guangdong, the province with the largest permanent population, ranks third with 19,166 pairs.
Why are there many divorces in Sichuan and Henan in the first quarter? Dong Yuzheng analyzed that there are many migrant workers in these two places. Some couples have been away for a long time, and their feelings are cold. They want to divorce, so it is inconvenient to take time off during their work. They discuss going home during the Spring Festival and going through divorce procedures together. This is also a factor that affects the total number of divorces in the first quarter.
On the other hand, although the resident population of Guangdong is as high as 126 million, ranking first in the country. But marriage and divorce are mainly linked to the registered population. Guangdong’s registered population is only 98.0866 million. In contrast, both Henan and Sichuan have a registered population significantly larger than the permanent population.
For example, the resident population of Henan is 99.366 million. In addition, there are 16.1 million people who are registered in Henan and live and work in other provinces, an increase of 5.95 million or 58.62% compared with 2010. Only 1.27 million people from other provinces flowed into Henan Province, with a net outflow of 14.83 million people from the province. In other words, the total registered population of Henan reached 114.19 million. There is a similar situation in Sichuan, where the permanent population is 83.67 million, but the registered population is more than 90 million, and the net outflow of population is also very large.
Ding Changfa, an associate professor in the Department of Economics of Xiamen University, analyzed the First Financial Report. In places where the registered population has a large outflow, the number of divorces has increased due to various factors such as the long-term separation of many couples.
This phenomenon objectively requires that the developed coastal areas should speed up the pace of citizenization of foreign population. Ding Changfa believes that the developed coastal areas should speed up the reform of the household registration system and the urbanization of migrant workers. These places should speed up the shortcomings of public services such as medical care, education, old-age care and housing, so that migrant workers can better integrate.
After Sichuan and Henan, the number of divorces in Guangdong, the largest economic province in the first quarter, was 19,166, only one more than that in Jiangsu, the fourth place. Generally speaking, although Guangdong and Fujian in South China are economically developed, the divorce rate is not high, which is also related to the relatively conservative concept of marriage influenced by traditional clan culture and other factors.
Table: divorce registration data in the first quarter of 2021 (unit: right. Source: First Financial Reporter compiled according to the data of the Ministry of Civil Affairs)
