Transnational marriage rate drops amid economic downturn

The rate of cross-border marriages had climbed from 15.69 percent in 1998 to 31.86 percent in 2003, according to MOI statistics. The 2003 figure translated into about one out of every three marriages in the country, with 50 percent of the cross-border marriages involving a Chinese spouse, the statistics showed.

However, after 2003, the rate of transnational marriages began declining and by 2008 had dropped to 14 percent, with one out of seven marriages in the country being transnational, the statistics indicated.

The biggest decline, 16 percent, was recorded for marriages between Taiwanese and Chinese spouses, followed by a 13 percent drop in legal unions between Taiwanese and Southeast Asian spouses.

The MOI attributed the drop in the cross-border marriage rate to a tighter immigration interview system introduced by the government and a comparative improvement in the economy of the home countries of most potential foreign spouses.

The National Immigration Agency has put in place a system under which Chinese spouses are interviewed upon entry into Taiwan, in an attempt to close the fake marriage loophole.

All foreign spouses from Southeast Asian countries are interviewed both in their home countries and at the point of entry into Taiwan, in accordance with the Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs' regulations.

"Taiwan's sluggish economy has probably also contributed to the decline in the number of cross-border marriages, " said Wang Shi-hou, an international marriage broker.

"In this time of economic recession, Taiwan men are showing less interest in marrying foreign women, " Wang said, citing the fact that it costs about NT$300,000 to arrange a marriage with a Vietnamese bride through a marriage broker.

"Therefore, many people are deferring their plans to marry," Wang added.

Meanwhile, the economic downturn is also dampening the enthusiasm of foreign women to marry Taiwanese men, as they fear that they would not be able to make ends meet, according to Wang.

Moreover, with the growth of China's economy in recent years, many Chinese women are no longer seeing Taiwan as a top choice for finding a husband, but rather are turning their attention more to Japan and South Korea, he said.

According to MOI statistics for last year, 66.7 percent of the Taiwanese men who married non-nationals chose women from China, Hong Kong and Macau, while 22 percent married Vietnamese wives, and 4.4 percent tied the knot with Indonesian women.

Also in 2008, some 869 Taiwanese women married Japanese men, 621 married men from China, Hong Kong and Macau, and 521 tied the knot with Americans, the statistics showed.

The statistics are in line with the so-called "marriage gradient theory" that men tend to marry women slightly below their own levels of achievement, in terms of education, income, and career, and social and economic status, according to Wang Yun-tung, an assistant professor of Social Work at National Taiwan University.

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