Alarming figure/ Only 9% of the baby bonus was used in January-April, Albania is aging

The number of babies who received the bonus for the period January-April 2025 decreases, following the downward trend in the number of beneficiaries from year to year.

According to data from the Financial Indicators Monitoring Report for 2025, from the 2.25 billion lek fund made available for the baby bonus, only 8.8% of payments have been made, covering 6,940 births for the period January-April.

Meanwhile, for 2024, with a similar fund of 2.2 billion lek, 27% of payments were made for 8,672 births, where 6,985 beneficiaries of the bonus were for births within the country and 1,687 beneficiary babies or 20% of them were abroad.

The decline in the number of babies born within the country benefiting from the bonus for January-April 2025 is about 1% less than January-April 2024.

The decline in births accelerates, 26% fewer babies in 4 years

The data shows a downward trend in beneficiary babies born within the country. For January-April 2023, the baby bonus fund covered payments for 11,707 births within the country and 5,107 of them were for births abroad. In total, the number of beneficiaries fell by 4% compared to the same period in 2022. However, about 43% of beneficiaries in 2023 turned out to have been born outside Albania.

According to INSTAT data for the first quarter of the year, the number of births nationwide was 4,662. Compared to the same period in 2024, the number of births fell by about 23%.

While the benefit from the total bonus fund of 20, 30 to 50% for babies born abroad was a stable phenomenon since the launch of the program in 2019. According to the Ministry of Health, in the four years 2019–2022, 11.5 billion lek were distributed to 161,943 beneficiary babies, of whom about 33% were born outside Albania.

The baby bonus, which offers a check worth up to 120,000 lek for the birth of a child, was also available to Albanian families living abroad until the end of 2023, as long as the child is registered in Albania. However, due to the high percentage of beneficiaries abroad and budgetary constraints, in May 2023 the Ministry of Health proposed legal changes to exclude people who are not residents of Albania from the benefit.

Amendments to Law No. 57/2019, “on social assistance in the Republic of Albania” entered into force in November 2023.

Meanwhile, in December 2023, with the approved amendments to the Council of Ministers' Decision "On determining the amount and procedure for providing immediate financial assistance for newborn babies and the manner of cooperation between hospital service institutions and civil status institutions", the government also established a new condition, where one of the parents or both parents must have lived for at least 180 days (almost 6 months) within Albania during the year before the child is born in order to benefit from the bonus.

The data would be verified through the TIMS system, which records when entering and leaving Albania via the border. The parent would also have to fill out a self-declaration form stating that they live in Albania.

Also, Prime Minister Edi Rama, during the May electoral campaign, said that the baby bonus would be replaced with a new scheme of immediate payments according to the number of children for periods of 2, 3 or 5 years./ Monitor