Is having children a moral duty?

There’s been a fair amount of focus on the concept of pronatalism recently and debate over whether it is left or right wing for governments to introduce policies that encourage women to have more babies. Others argue that the matter is too big to be consumed by the culture wars.

This week, the United Nations Population Fund issued its strongest statement yet on fertility decline, warning that hundreds of millions of people are not able to have the number of children they want, citing the prohibitive cost of parenthood and the lack of a suitable partner as some of the reasons affecting birth rates across the world.

For a country in the developed world to increase or maintain its population, it needs a birth rate of 2.1 children per woman on average. Last year in the UK, it fell to 1.4. Like many developed nations, women are having fewer babies, which poses economic problems as countries face the impact of both aging and declining populations, and a smaller workforce in relation to the number of pensioners.

Why are people in richer nations choosing to have fewer babies? Has parenthood had a bad press? Is it too expensive to have kids or do people just wait too long to tick off life goals before they realise their fertility window has closed?

And is it manipulative for governments to encourage women to have more children? For some, a low birth rate is the sign of a civilised society where women have reproductive autonomy. Is there a moral duty to have children?

PRESENTER Michael Buerk PANELLISTS Ash Sarkar, Giles Fraser, Mona Siddiqui, James Orr GUESTS Caroline Farrow, Prof Anna Rotrich, Prof Lisa Schipper, Sarah Ditum PRODUCER Catherine Murray ASSISTANT PRODUCER Peter Everett EDITOR Tim Pemberton