In four out of 10 internationally married couples in Korea, the husbands are at least 10 years older than their wives.

According to the report from the Korea Statistics Thursday, 21,709 international couples got married last year, marking a 3.4 percent drop from 2015. The rate has been declining for the past six years.

After the government started to strictly monitor international matchmaking agencies in 2010, the number of international marriages has been decreasing. 


However, the percentage of marriages between older Korean men and younger foreign women went up. Among the international couples who got married in 2016, in 40.2 percent of the cases, the men were more than 10 years older than the wives. Similar cases were observed in only 3.5 percent of Korean marriages.

Based on the nationality, 27.2 percent of the foreign wives came from Vietnam. Around 26.9 and 4.3 percent, were respectively from China and Philippines.

Before divorcing, the international marriages lasted for an average of 7.4 years, compared to 15.5 years for Korean couples.

By Im Eun-byel (silverstar@heraldcorp.com)