Marriage numbers in Canada decline by 6.8 per cent in one year.After a brief millennium boom, the number of couples saying 'I do' declined sharply in 2001. According to a report from Statistics Canada, fewer Canadians than ever got married that year.
"A total of 146,618 couples tied the knot, down 6.8 per cent from 157,395 in 2000," the agency said in a statement accompanying the release of its Marriage, 2001 report on Thursday.
The numbers resume a downward trend in the number of marriages throughout the 1990s, bringing the agency's "crude marriage rate" to a record low of 4.7 marriages for every 1,000 people.
An upward blip in the marriage rate in 2000 to a five-year high of 5.1 was probably an anomaly, the agency said, "attributable to couples choosing to marry at the start of the new millennium."