TEHRAN – Imam Khomeini Relief Foundation has provided free marriage counseling services to 222,000 individuals over the past [Iranian calendar] year (March 2020- March 2021), Ali Jafari, Deputy head of the Foundation for cultural affairs has announced.

The conscious choice of spouse and partner is the main goal of counseling training for young people on the verge of marriage, he stated.

Providing family education, Islamic-Iranian lifestyle, characteristics of the ideal spouse, correct choice and familiarity with the criteria for choosing a spouse are among the training provided to these groups, he explained.

Some 1,300 counselors provide marriage education in these workshops nationwide, he stated.

During the last year, about 58,000 people under the Foundation’s coverage received pre-marital education, Jafari said, adding, more than 27,000 clients also benefited from counseling services for young couples.

Mohammad Mehdi Tondgooyan, deputy minister of sports and youth, has said that the marriage rate downward trend after 17 years, despite the prevalence of the coronavirus and its economic consequences, has risen and Iran experienced a five percent growth in marriage.
The marriage rate in Iran has increased by 5 percent over the past [Iranian calendar] year (March 2020-March 2021).

Demographic issue

The fertility rate in Iran has been declining over the past eight years, the lowest of which was related to the past [Iranian calendar] year (March 2019- March 2020) with a birth rate of 1.2, according to the data published by the Statistics Center.

The number of births in the whole country faced a downtrend over the past three years, as registered births decreased to 1,196,135 over the past [Iranian calendar] year; a difference of roughly over 120,000 to 16,000 per year.

Population decline comes up with consequences, including the reduction of the working population (aged 15 to 64) and the aging population in the coming decades.

Some 14 policies to support childbearing and the family were announced by the Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in [the Iranian calendar year] 1393 (March 2014-March 2015) when he stressed that social, cultural, and economic development should be done in accordance with these general policies to support families.

The policies address the need to increase the population and the various dimensions of it, including childbearing, facilitating marriage and strengthening the family, reproductive health, promoting the Iranian-Islamic lifestyle, empowering young people, honoring the elderly, and the environment, which can lead to an increase in the quantity and quality of the population if it is timely and continuous implemented.

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