Measures to promote the country’s demographic recovery are being implemented as a top priority, Labour Minister Yiannis Panayiotou said on Wednesday.
Reiterating President Nikos Christodoulides’ TV announcement on the new measures on Monday, Panayiotou said the demographic data are concerning at an EU-wide level, indicating diminishing fertility rates which affect the working base populations and put pressure on state pension systems.
For Cyprus the data show that over the past 20 years the average birth rate per woman fell from 1.46 children in 2002 to 1.37 in 2022. The average age at the birth of the first child has increased from 26.7 yrs old in 2002 to 29.8 in 2022.
Life expectancy, meanwhile, has increased during the same period, from 77.5 yrs to 81.6. The ratio of employed persons to pensioners has subsequently dropped from 2.51 workers per pensioner, to 1.82 per pensioner in 2022.
In view of this situation, the cabinet decided to roll out a comprehensive policy towards a “family friendly” work life, thereby indirectly encouraging an increased birth rate, he said.
In tandem, the state is looking to increase the numbers of workers by facilitating employment, or return to employment, among certain groups.
Total investment in the measures would amount to over €100 million.
The first bundle of measures has already been implemented during the first 18 months of the current government, and had cost €50 million, while the second tranche will be paid out in stages for measure to be introduced over the following 12 months.
The second bundle of measures, to start retroactively from October this year, will include an increase in maternity incentives for around 8,000 mothers, who will be eligible to receive €1000 for the first child, €1500 for the second child, and €2000 for their third child.
The number of those eligible for parental leave will double by extending the age limit of the child from 8 to 15 years old. Additionally, a targeted increase in parental leave allowance will apply, which will permit up to 10 weeks’ leave for a second child, and 12 for the third (previously eight weeks for both).
Additionally, a horizontal subsidy for families of five or more children will go into effect without income criteria.
In the first half of 2025, the setting up of child-care and after school facilities in workplaces will take place, through business incentives, as well as the extension of opening hours for baby stations until 7.30pm.
Financial support is to be provided for mothers under 30, who are eligible for maternity allowance, following the birth of their first child, of up to €200 monthly for two years, starting in September 2025.
As for measures aimed to boost the numbers of workers, these are to include strengthening opportunities for unemployed and underemployed women, under 30 and over 50 years of age, and the promotion of seasonal work by students, as well as regulation of paid internships.
The induction of 315 unemployed persons over the age of 50 is to begin within the next weeks through career guidance, salary subsidisation, and professional development.
Four hundred unemployed or under employed women will likewise be inducted into the working population, as well as 350 persons under 30, through guidance and subsidy schemes to be announced in 2025.
The regulation of paid internships with a minimum compensation permitted, is to be introduced with a bill to Parliament, also next year.
A third bundle of demographic restoration measures is to be enacted in the longer term, and will be combined with taxation and pension system reforms, and the conversion of all schools to daylong facilities.
Previously, the first stage had included extension of maternity leave by four weeks (to eight) and to the self-employed, housing subsidies for young couples, increase in child subsidies, and introduction of IVF subsidies, among others.
Elsewhere, as part of the effort, the national council for demographics and family policy is to be upgraded and restructured using tools provided by the European Union for demographic regulation, the labour ministry added.
The council is set to meet on November 7.
“The state will diligently follow indices that are expected to reveal the progress made in the gradual achievement of [demographic] goals, […] and meanwhile will prepare the next bundle of [measures] to boost the collective effort in [this] highest-level national priority,” the minister said.
