Head Of BKKBN Reveals Different Goals To Pressure Having Children' So The Reason For The Marriage Rate To Drop

PIXABAY ILLUSTRATION

Head of the National Population and Family Planning Agency (BKKBN) Dr. Hasto Wardoyo said the difference in goals between men and women was one of the reasons that caused the number of marriages to drop.

"There are three purposes for marriage, security, protection (producing offspring), and recreation, now if the female instincts are more security, women if they are loved completely, even though they don't have children will be calm, but if you don't have children, you can continue to be nervous," he said, quoted by ANTARA, Saturday, March 9.

Hasto said that in general, the goal of married couples in Indonesia is still to be procreated or to produce offspring.

He said the average age of married women was also getting backward, from 20 to 22.3 years.

"The more old people get married, even though they used to be married for 20 years, now women tend to resign, even though getting older it causes stunting, if 35 years old so that their children are at risk of stunting," he said.

According to Hasto, the pressure of the people around him is also one of the factors that makes people do not want to get married.

"If we are married in Indonesia, there must be pressure to have children, because if we are married in Indonesia, during Eid al-Fitr, for example, we must be asked whether we have children or not?" he said.

Hasto explained that based on data from the Marriage Management Information System (Simkah) from the Ministry of Religion (Kemenag), it was recorded that 1,544,571 Muslim couples got married in 2023. This figure decreased when compared to 2022 which reached 1.71 million couples.

"There are not 1.5 million married, but it could be 1.7 million if it is calculated by non-Muslims, so if estimated, since 2020 the marriage rate is around 1.7 million, both Muslim and non-Muslim, but in 2023 it has indeed decreased," he said.

He also highlighted the average age of having sex for the first time in adolescents aged 15-19 years which is increasing. The percentage of women aged 15-19 years who have had sexual intercourse was recorded at 59 percent, while men at 74 percent.

"So we can see yes, the average marriage is 22 years, but the sex is 15-19 years, so our adultery increases, this is homework for all of us, because if we don't know much, it can be dangerous, if we get married too young, the uterine mouth cancer is at high risk," said Dr. Hasto Wardoyo.