If women have to do the lion’s share of raising children, it often forces them to choose between family and career. If you take the burden off women, maybe they can have both. That’s the reasoning that Japan, and several other countries, have adopted.

Japan is the world’s most aged society. It buys more adult incontinence products than nappies, and its 2021 TFR was just 1.26. In response, it’s calling on fathers to help with domestic chores. The Japanese Ministry of Health Labour and Welfare has found a direct link between the amount of childcare new fathers undertake and the number of subsequent children they have. To encourage them, it wants 85% of them to take paternity leave from Japan’s tough workplace culture. This year, a record 30% of them did. Japan also plans to subsidise men and women to work shorter hours while children are young.

The initiative mirrors a similar policy in Sweden, which has introduced a so-called Daddy Month – a month of extra paid holiday for whichever spouse has not already taken parental leave. Here too, more fathers took up the offer. It seems unlikely fertility rates will rise dramatically in either Sweden or Japan, though; by 2100 they’re expected to be 1.38 and 1.21 respectively.

The ageing population challenge and how countries are tackling it