Kann die neue Technologie die astronomischen Preise für Bestattungen senken?

Some time ago, Shanghai released a series of data. By the end of 2024, the number of residents with Shanghai household registration was 15.3798 million. Among them, 5.7762 million residents were 60 years old and above, accounting for 37.6% of the total population with Shanghai household registration.

In other words, about four out of ten Shanghai residents are seniors. This figure is a bit alarming, and the age structure in China as a whole is not rosy either. It is estimated that China will enter the stage of severe aging in 2035 (the proportion of people over 65 years old exceeds 21%).

Japan, which is only separated from us by a strip of sea, has long been troubled by the aging population. On the previous "Respect for the Aged Day", the Japanese Ministry of Internal Affairs announced that as of September 15, the number of seniors in Japan was 36.25 million, accounting for 29.3% of the total population and an increase of 0.2 percentage points.

The increasing number of seniors not only makes it difficult to support them but also to bury them.

Under the influence of Confucian culture, the Chinese have always attached great importance to the burial rituals of seniors. Even Mencius once said: "Caring about the living cannot be regarded as a major matter. Only burying the dead can be regarded as a major matter." However, to make it grand and solemn, it costs money. In the face of the rising cemetery prices and the high prices of services and items in the funeral industry, more and more people can only sigh and say: "One can neither live nor die."

In recent years, technological development seems to have opened up new ideas for the form of burial. Especially when the attitude of the younger generation towards burial rituals has changed significantly, their acceptance of new forms could curb the phenomenon of expensive burials.

Exclusive burials, more cost - effectiveness

How much does a decent burial cost?

A global study on funeral costs published by the British life insurance company SunLife in 2020 shows that the average funeral costs around the world are about 10% of the annual income of residents. The average funeral costs in Japan are up to 3 million yen (about 200,000 yuan), accounting for about 68% of the average annual income of the Japanese. In China, the funeral costs are about 37,375 yuan, accounting for about 45.4% of the average annual income and ranking second in the world.

Nowadays, the funeral costs are rising year by year. The data from the China Funeral Association shows that the average cost of a traditional burial in China in 2024 was about 78,000 yuan, and in the first - tier cities, it was even over 150,000 yuan.

For ordinary Japanese and Chinese families, the funeral costs, which are much higher than in other countries, are a considerable burden. And with the decreasing birth rate, it means that these costs may have to be borne by a single family.

While families are suffering from high funeral costs and seniors are worried about their burials, new forms of burial have emerged in recent years.

At the beginning of last year, the Vulcan Centaur rocket developed by the United Launch Alliance (ULA) launched the "Peregrine" lunar lander, developed by an American space robotics company, into space. Of the 20 effective payloads that the "Peregrine" took to the moon, five were NASA scientific instruments, and the other 15 came from different customers, including the two commercial space burial companies Elysium Space and Celestis.

As the name suggests, "space burial" sends the ashes into space, where they burn like a meteor. Another option is to pack the ashes in a special container and launch it into space together with an artificial satellite. The container can orbit the Earth for up to 240 years.

For most people who yearn for and strive towards space, space burial is undoubtedly a very romantic final destination. But flying into space is of course not easy to achieve. Therefore, the Japanese have invented "balloon burial", which can be regarded as a cheaper version of space burial. They fill the ashes into a balloon and let it rise into the sky. According to information, this balloon explodes after about three hours when it reaches a height of about 50 kilometers above the Earth and bursts under the influence of air pressure. Then the ashes return to nature.

In addition to space and the sky, sea burial and tree burial have also developed, with the sea and trees serving as final destinations. These two forms can also be seen from time to time in China.

Actually, not only the form of burial but also the entire process has changed due to new needs and concepts. In Japan, part of the high funeral costs is due to the prayers in temples. The robot Pepper developed by SoftBank was programmed to take on the role of a real priest and bury the deceased. Due to the aging society, some seniors with disabilities cannot attend funerals. A Japanese company has also proposed "mobile funerals", where the morgue is set up in a vehicle so that people who have difficulty attending the funeral can wait on the vehicle to greet the funeral guests.

These changes directly target the high prices of traditional burials. Pepper's "appearance fee" is about 50,000 yen; the cost of mobile funerals starts at 130,000 yen; the cost of balloon burial is 240,000 yen per person; even the high - end space burial is cheaper than expected: about 450,000 to 500,000 yen (about 28,000 to 30,000 yuan).

In the face of the trend of simplifying burial rituals, these currently somewhat exotic forms could become a new option in the future.

Will the younger generation bring a "revolution" of death?

The simplification of burial rituals has been a development trend in the funeral industry in recent years. According to the latest "Report on the Development of the Funeral Industry in China 2025" published by the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the rate of simplified burials in China has increased from 27% in 2020 to 58% at the beginning of 2025, more than doubling.

Similarly, Japan, where burial rituals are more elaborate, is also moving towards "simplifying everything". Especially after the pandemic, more and more small - scale funerals with only family members are being accepted.

In the face of the trend of simplifying burial rituals, new forms of farewell such as "mobile funerals", "balloon burials" and "space burials" may seem a bit outlandish at first, but they undoubtedly correspond to this change. And compared with the burdens brought by traditional burials, the cost advantage is also very obvious. Of course, this does not mean that these new forms will prevail. But it is obvious that the younger generation has completely different thoughts and ideas about death and burials than the older generation. This could be an opportunity.

Take Japan as an example. A few days ago, a Japanese funeral company published a survey. The results show that among the 1,500 respondents aged 20 to 70, 24.6% have already made "end - of - life plans". The proportion of those over 70 is the highest, at 48%. Surprisingly, the 20 - year - old generation ranks second with 26.8%.

The so - called "end - of - life planning" means preparing for the end of life. Many young people decide to make a will early. This shows that they strive for "self - responsibility". In other words, in burial rituals, young people prefer to make their own decisions rather than follow social traditions.

In particular, they attach more importance to experiences and emotional expression in life than to the grandeur after death.

This phenomenon is even more widespread and recognized in the United States. In the book "I Want to Be Buried Like This" by Shannon Lee Dawdy, an anthropologist at the University of Chicago, it is mentioned that self - organized burials are becoming more and more popular due to their attractiveness. Behind this phenomenon is a rapid change in the attitude of the American population towards death: People don't want to miss this last chance to show their individuality. The search for the best way to handle the body (or for their relatives) becomes their last wish.

Facing death and burial rituals and planning early is also the idea of many young Chinese. A survey conducted by NetEase Data Reading in cooperation with the team of Professor Guo Lin from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, in which 8,237 people participated, shows that young people are very cautious about the burials of their relatives but much more relaxed about their own burials. Moreover, they think some traditional burial customs are outdated and just formalities.

This attitude directly affects their choice of burial form, process and related items. For example, when choosing a cemetery, whether it is men or women, the cost advantage comes before feng shui. Or they are more likely to accept ecological burial forms such as tree burial and flower burial.

Although the changes of the younger generation are not able to change the burial customs that have developed over thousands of years and have been preserved to this day, it is possible that when they get older and more and more people voluntarily choose the desired burial form, the new burial forms will become even more popular than they are today.

Can one make money from low - cost burials?

The constantly rising cemetery prices, opaque services and the influence of traditional ideas have always associated the funeral industry with high profits.

For example, in the case of funeral items: The wholesale price of most urns on the market is in the range of a few hundred yuan or even lower, while the selling price is several thousand yuan or even over ten thousand yuan.

The "industry rule" is generally to make a profit of ten or twenty times. A reporter found that in a county - level cemetery management, an urn made of golden oak with a crane emblem is sold for 5,694 yuan, while similar products are offered for 700 yuan on the Internet. Another sandalwood urn with colored stones is sold for 2,990 yuan, while the same product is available for 300 yuan on the Internet.

Fushouyuan, known as the "first listed company in the funeral industry", has maintained a profit margin of over 80% since 2019, and the price of tombstones is rising year by year.

Compared with traditional burials, the price premium for new forms such as space burial is much lower. Can this ensure the survival and development...