Japan's population drops below 125 million, down for 12th year

As of Oct 1 last year, the total population including foreigners saw a decrease of 556,000, or 0.44 per cent from the previous year, according to the latest population estimates released by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications.

The number of Japanese nationals, which came in at 12.2 million, plunged by 750,000, the decline of which has been expanding since 2011, the ministry said in an online report.

The figure represented the largest comparable decline since comparable data became available in 1950, Xinhua quoted a Kyodo News report.

In the latest count, the number of people under the age of 15 came to 14.5 million, making up for the lowest-ever 11.6 per cent of the population, while those aged 65 or over totalled about 36.23 million, slightly up from a year earlier to account for 29 per cent of the total.

Of the total population, males accounted for 48.6 per cent with a fall for the 15th consecutive year, while the female population saw the 12th consecutive year of decline to account for 51.4 per cent.

The population sex ratio, or the ratio of males to females in a population, was 94.7, with females outnumbering males by 3,431,000, the data showed.

Japan's total population fell below the previous year's level for the first time in 2005, then peaked in 2008, and has declined for 12 consecutive years since 2011, the ministry's report said.

With a declining birthrate and an aging population, a shrinking workforce and a greater financial burden on the medical and social security systems are posing challenges to the country.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has on multiple occasions promised to focus on policies related to children this year, vowing to tackle the low birthrate through "unprecedented" steps.

In the latest move to tackle the falling birthrate, the Japanese government put into operation a new administrative body Children and Families Agency to better serve the country's child-related policies.