More than one-fourth of Japan's population is over 65

Tokyo, Sep 15 (IANS/EFE) The number of people aged 65 or older reached a record figure of 32.9 million Monday in Japan, a number which represents 25.9 percent of the Asian country's population, according to data released by Japan's ministry of internal affairs and communications.

The number of senior citizens increased to 1.1 million, or by 0.9 percent, in comparison with the previous year, according to the data published on the Day of Elderly Monday.

The ministry attributed this significant rise specially to those who were born in 1949, the last year of Japan's "baby boom" after World War II, and reached the age of 65.

The number of people aged 75 or more is 15.9 million, or 12.5 percent of the population.

The Japanese authorities estimate that one out of every three people will be over 65 in 2035, when the people exceeding the age of 75 will comprise one-fifth of the population.

Last week, the government revealed that the country has almost 59,000 people of age 100 years or more which sets a new record of longevity in the population.

The number of hundred-year-old people registered Sep 1 rose to 58,820 -- 4,423 more than the figure recorded on the same date in 2013, or 46.21 per 100,000 inhabitants.

The first such count in Japan was done in 1963 when there were 153 centenarians.

In 1998, the figure, which has been increasing since 1971, exceeded 10,000; 30,000 were registered in 2007, five years later it surpassed the threshold of 50,000 and in 2013 it rose to 54,000.

The ageing of the Japanese population, which is already the longest-living of the planet, is a big challenge for the sustainability of the healthcare and pension systems of the world's third largest economy.

The current demographic map contrasts with that of the early 1960s, when Japan established bases of its universal social security system at a time when people over 65 years accounted for less than 6 percent of the population.

--IANS/EFE

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