A generation ago, having children soon after marriage was almost automatic for Cambodian couples. Today, that certainty is gone. From Phnom Penh to Siem Reap, young partners are doing the math — rent, tuition, hospital fees — and concluding that a baby is a luxury they can’t yet afford. In a fast-changing economy, “ជំនាន់ថ្មី” (chom-nan thmei, the new generation) is choosing to wait.
According to the report by Kiripost (kiripost.com), many young couples openly admit that they “can’t afford a baby yet” as economic and social pressures harden around them. The country’s fertility rate — long part of an era where large families symbolized prosperity and pride — continues to slide. From an average of around four children per woman in the early 2000s, Cambodia’s total fertility rate has fallen to approximately 2.5–2.7. That’s a profound cultural shift in a society where having children remains deeply tied to notions of family continuity and social identity.
Behind this demographic transition, though, lie individual dilemmas. Young couples describe the rising costs of urban life: tiny apartments in Phnom Penh costing more than half a monthly salary, tuition fees that now include both Khmer and English programs, and health-care expenses that families in earlier generations rarely had to consider. A recent Cambodianess report captured the anxiety of mothers balancing care for children and ageing parents while economic uncertainty nips at their heels. For many, delaying parenthood is not an act of rebellion but an act of survival.
Cultural attitudes are shifting in tandem. Young Khmer professionals are entering the workforce later, pursuing higher education, and delaying marriage itself. The median age at first birth has risen to 23.3 years, up from earlier decades. What used to be a predictable path — marriage, children, then stability — is now reordered, with stability becoming a prerequisite rather than a result. Among friends and relatives, couples still feel the gentle pressure of elders asking, “ម៉ែនតើ?” (maen tae?, “When?”) but the meaning of readiness has transformed.
The urban–rural divide adds another layer. While rural families still average more children, urban couples in places like Phnom Penh and Battambang increasingly prefer smaller families — or none just yet. The concept of a “គ្រួសារតូច” (kruoh-sar toch, small family) is no longer taboo; it is simply pragmatic. Access to contraception, broader life aspirations, and the desire for financial resilience all shape these new family models.
Yet hesitation comes with risks. Biology doesn’t bend to economic realities. Some couples who delay too long may face fertility challenges later, a topic still sensitive in Khmer society. Demographers warn that Cambodia could eventually mirror trends seen across East and Southeast Asia, where low birth rates strain ageing-population systems. The OECD’s recent analysis of Asia-Pacific societies notes that rising costs, job insecurity and postponed marriage collectively drag down fertility across the region.
For now, young Cambodian couples continue to negotiate the balance between hopes and harsh arithmetic. They talk late at night in small apartments, sipping iced coffee or ទឹកអំពៅ (tœ̆k ampov, sugar-palm juice), wondering whether “រួចរាល់” (ruoch-roal, “being ready”) is something they will ever fully feel. Parenthood hasn’t lost its meaning — but it has gained new conditions. And until those conditions shift, the baby clothes stay folded, the cradle stays empty, and Cambodia’s new generation keeps waiting for a moment that feels possible.
Every time I hear someone scolding a young Cambodian couple for “waiting too long” to have children, I want to take a deep breath, sip my iced coffee, and ask: what is this obsession with making babies as soon as the wedding drums stop echoing? As if life were a conveyor belt — marry, reproduce, repeat. Please. Auntie knows better, and so do today’s young couples.
Let’s start with a simple fact that all those loud aunties and uncles conveniently forget: Cambodia is already one of the youngest countries in Southeast Asia. Everywhere you look, there are children — millions of them — and they deserve more than overcrowded classrooms, underpaid teachers, and education systems struggling to keep pace with a modern economy. When a country has a youth bulge, the challenge is not producing more babies; it’s ensuring the babies already here grow up educated, healthy, supported, and capable of contributing to a changing world. If anything, “more children” is not the answer — better childhoods is.
And yet, the chorus continues: “When will you have a baby?” “You’re not getting younger.” “A family is not complete without children.” Oh, spare me. This isn’t 1950, and these young couples aren’t living on farms where a dozen kids were the labor force. They are living in Phnom Penh apartments the size of a generous closet. They are juggling uncertain jobs, rising rents, and a cost of living that would make even your great-aunt faint. But more importantly — and Auntie applauds this loudly — they are thinking about themselves for a moment. About stability. About mental peace. About building a partnership before plunging into the biggest responsibility of all: raising another human being.
Let’s give them credit. They’re not “selfish”. They’re cautious, thoughtful, pragmatic. They know that being a parent in 2025 is not a romanticized village fantasy; it’s a full-time emotional, financial, logistical marathon. And they want to be ready — not just in the wallet, but in the heart and mind. They want to live a little, see the world, save money, build careers, enjoy each other’s company before their sleep schedules and social lives evaporate into the land of diapers and night-feeds.
So here is Auntie’s verdict: young Cambodian couples are not the problem. They are the solution — to overpopulation pressures, to overstretched public services, to unrealistic cultural expectations. Let them breathe. Let them plan. Let them wait. And when they finally decide to become parents — if they do — they will do it with intention, love, and readiness. Which, if you ask me, is the only recipe for raising good humans.