Three-child proposal scientific, Bağış says

ISTANBUL - Anatolia News Agency

Bağış tells a reproduction meet that the PM’s demand for 3 kids is scientific. AA photo

EU minister and chief negotiator Egemen Bağış told participants at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology’s (ESHRE) congress that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s demand for at least three children per family has a scientific basis.

The 28th-annual meeting of ESHRE, one of the most prestigious conferences related to reproductive health worldwide, opened in Istanbul on Sunday. Over 10,000 people from 150 countries are participating, and more than 300 lecturers are expected to speak at the conference.

“It is inevitable that societies that cannot renew their cells and preserve their reproductive capability will face infertility problems in every field and fall into a vicious cycle,” Bağış said.

The average age in Turkey is 29.7, and therefore aging Europe needs Turkey, Bağıs said. “Statistics show that Turkey’s population will get older in the medium and the long term. Therefore, our prime minister’s demand for at least three children [per family] is completely based on scientific data. It is a realistic and visionary proposal. In 2011, the annual rate of population growth in Turkey was 13.5 per thousand. Between 1990 and 2008, Turkey’s population growth rate constantly decreased, and regressed from 17 to 11.7 per thousand. The population growth increased to 13.4 per thousand in 2008, but it returned to a trend of decrease from 2009 on. By 2025, the population growth rate will regress to 7.7 per thousand. Turkey’s population will be 85,407,000 then. The death rates are increasing each year. The number of deaths was 392,000 in 1990, while it increased to 459,000 in 2010,” he said.

The data show that the Erdoğan’s “three children” proposal is based on reasonable grounds, according to Bağış. “If we lose the dynamism of the population, we will also lose the dynamism in the economy. When we consider the economic, political, and humanistic crises the EU countries face, we could say that one of the reasons behind it is this vicious cycle,” he said, adding that Erdoğan’s “three children” proposal had become a model which has attracted the attention of the international community and is being followed by some countries with interest.