‘Happy Pohang with Children’, Pohang City’s Childbirth and Childcare Policies at a Glance

From This Year, Parental Allowance: 700,000 KRW/Month for Age 0, 350,000 KRW/Month for Age 1

Birth Incentives, First Meeting Voucher, Special Multi-Child Care Benefits, and Other Birth Promotion Programs

Resumption of Birth Healing Classes A

Pohang City is making every effort to create a happy environment for both children and parents this year through customized support tailored to each life stage, including pregnancy, childbirth, childcare, and child-rearing.

Starting this year, a new program called ‘Parent Allowance’ is being provided to families with children under the age of one to support childbirth families. For children raised at home, 700,000 KRW per month is provided for infants aged 0 (0?11 months), and 350,000 KRW per month for children aged 1 (12?23 months).

The ‘Parent Allowance’ can be received without a separate application process if the child born after 2022 is already receiving the existing infant allowance (either 300,000 KRW monthly cash or childcare fees), and it cannot be combined with full-day childcare services.

Additionally, for children attending daycare centers, infants aged 0 receive 186,000 KRW to cover the difference in daycare fees, while children aged 1 receive support for the childcare fees only.

Along with this, Pohang City continues to support its own program ‘Childbirth Encouragement Grant’ this year, providing 1,000,000 KRW for the first child, 2,900,000 KRW for the second child, 4,100,000 KRW for the third child, and 11,300,000 KRW for the fourth child for children born after January 1, 2022. The city also continues to promote the special multi-child care allowance program for families with four or more children under the age of 10, as well as the Gyeongbuk Childbirth Celebration Coupon project.

Furthermore, a ‘First Meeting Voucher’ worth 2,000,000 KRW per child is provided in voucher form to children who have been assigned a resident registration number after birth registration, and the existing ‘Child Allowance’ of 100,000 KRW per month is supported up to the age of 95 months (under 8 years old).

In addition, the city dispatches health care workers to childbirth families to support postpartum recovery of mothers and newborn care through the Maternal and Newborn Health Care Support Service, providing free support for up to 15 days to promote maternal health and encourage childbirth.

The city also supports ovarian function tests and rubella antibody tests for women newlyweds preparing for pregnancy (including early pregnancy), and semen analysis fees for men. For infertile couples wishing to have children, the city has expanded support for infertility treatment costs, previously limited to couples with income below 180% of the median income, to all infertile couples residing in Gyeongbuk for more than six months (registered resident address), regardless of income.

Moreover, Pohang City provides various maternal and child health services including ▲support for fetal anomaly screening costs for pregnant women ▲medical expense support for high-risk pregnant women ▲medical expense support for premature and congenital anomaly infants ▲diaper and formula support for low-income families ▲support for teenage mothers’ pregnancy and childbirth ▲congenital metabolic disorder screening and patient management ▲medical expense support for families with three or more children ▲medical expense support for children with atopic dermatitis and asthma ▲nutritional plus supplementary food support ▲early life health management projects.

In particular, the Nam-gu and Buk-gu Public Health Centers plan to resume the childbirth healing classes, which were suspended due to COVID-19 for three years. The Nam-gu Public Health Center continues to provide various supports such as customized nutrition plus for multicultural families, home visit accompaniment for early life target families, and counseling and interpretation services for maternal and child health projects to support the increasing number of multicultural families.

Additionally, the city implements fee reduction programs for multi-child families, including reductions in water and sewage fees, public parking fees, library program usage fees, and operates the ‘Working Mom SOS Service Project’ as a measure to address childcare gaps for dual-income couples.

The city also plans to hold various programs this year, including the successful ‘Happy Trip for Large Families’ and ‘Family Day Movie Screening’ events on Culture Day held last year.

Mayor Lee Kang-deok stated, “Overcoming low birth rates is an issue that everyone must continuously consider and solve together,” adding, “We will continue to develop childbirth encouragement and child-rearing burden reduction measures to make Pohang a city where it is good to give birth and raise children.”

2022 Multi-Child Happy Trip.