The number of elementary school students in Seoul dropped to its lowest levels last year since the city started recording 46 years ago, officials said Sunday.

According to the Seoul Metropolitan Government, the capital had 535,948 students enrolled in elementary school last year.

The report highlights the effects of the low birthrate that has plagued Korea.

The report found that the number of elementary school students peaked in 1982 at 1,183,735 and fluctuated until 2001 (when 763,000 were enrolled), after which the numbers steadily declined.

“If the low fertility rate of 1.02 continues, the number of elementary school students will also continue to drop,” said a city official in a press release.

According to the OECD, as of 2009 Korea has the lowest fertility rate (1.15 births per woman) of all member states. The data cites families choosing to have fewer children and highly educated women choosing to put off marriage as the primary reasons for the low rate.

Seoul City’s report confirmed the OECD data and found a disparity among sexes in the single population here.

It showed that a large proportion, or 40.7 percent, of unmarried women in their mid-30s to mid-40s were at least university graduates. While unmarried men in their 40s were mainly high school graduates or lower.

Of all Seoul men in their 40s more than 13 percent (102,963) remain unmarried, and more than 15 percent (125,493) of Seoul women in their mid-30s to 40s remain single.

The rate of those in their 40s staying single is a staggering increase from 10 years ago when only 4.3 percent of men remained unmarried and 5.5 percent of women.

By Robert Lee (robert@heraldcorp.com)