Sat, Jan 17, 2026 page8

• EDITORIAL: Difficulties of legislating surrogacy

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  The Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation on Monday voiced strong opposition to surrogacy legalization, saying that the procedure treats wombs as “commodities for producing children for others.” The criticism came after the Executive Yuan last month proposed amendments to the Artificial Reproduction Act (人工生殖法) that would grant married female couples and single women access to assisted reproductive services. Opposition parties proposed their own version of the bill that would additionally legalize surrogacy.

  The foundation said that the act and surrogacy “fall under different policy domains” and that legalizing surrogacy could lead to the exploitation of women from disadvantaged backgrounds.

  In late 2024, the Ministry of Health and Welfare removed references to surrogacy from the act, citing opposition from constituents, and the complexity of weighing the competing rights and interests of all stakeholders.

  Unlike standard assisted reproductive techniques, which help women to conceive and carry their own pregnancies, surrogacy introduces a third party, whose body, health and autonomy are central to the arrangement — a reality that moves the issue into a far more complex policy domain.

  The Cabinet’s amendments are framed narrowly, addressing a long-standing inequity in Taiwan’s reproductive laws. The regulations limit assisted reproduction to heterosexual married couples, excluding single women and married lesbian couples. Expanding access to the services is presented as a matter of reproductive autonomy.

  However, surrogacy raises a different set of ethical, practical and legal concerns. Although some countries permit surrogacy under strict regulations, experience suggests that even the most carefully designed systems struggle to prevent exploitation.

  The UK, Canada and parts of western Europe allow only so-called “altruistic” surrogacy, prohibiting payment beyond expense reimbursement. Yet telling altruism from coercion is far from straightforward.

  How should regulators determine whether a woman has agreed to carry a pregnancy out of genuine willingness rather than financial pressure? Economic vulnerability can manifest through informal “gifts,” family obligations, debt, housing and promises of support — all difficult, if not impossible, to monitor. A ban on compensation would not eliminate incentives, but merely push them out of sight.

  This issue is compounded by the intimate and prolonged nature of pregnancy itself. Surrogacy contracts often seek to regulate a woman’s diet, movement, medical decisions and personal conduct for months. Even with formal consent, enforcement risks subordinating bodily autonomy to the expectations of intended parents. When disputes arise over medical complications, fetal abnormalities or emotional attachment to the child, the law offers no clean resolution that does not compromise any party’s rights.

  Proponents argue that Taiwan’s challenges demand creative solutions. Taiwanese are having children later in life, infertility is more common and the nation’s fertility rate has fallen to historic lows while society approaches “super-aged” status.

  Yet population anxiety should not justify policies that shift physical risk onto those with the least bargaining power. That some women cannot carry pregnancies does not, on its own, resolve whether others should bear that burden for them.

  Legalizing surrogacy would require statutory safeguards, continuous oversight, investigative capacity and enforcement mechanisms capable of detecting subtle forms of coercion and exploitation. Authorities would be tasked with policing private relationships, financial arrangements and bodily decisions in ways that lie far beyond the legitimate scope of the state. The likelihood of gaps in oversight, exploitation and disputes would be high — not because lawmakers lack good intentions, but because the practice of surrogacy itself resists clean regulation.

  Recognizing these limits does not equate to denying the pain of infertility or dismissing nontraditional paths to family-building. Rather, it is an acknowledgment that some social risks cannot be engineered away through legislation.

  Concerns about Taiwan’s low fertility rate are valid, but the practical reality of surrogacy cannot be ignored. Legalizing surrogacy in any form carries significant risks of exploitation, coercion and commodification, and any legal framework capable of preventing them would require government overreach. At present, there is simply no feasible and ethical path forward.

  Lawmakers would be wise to continue treating surrogacy as a separate and deeply contentious issue, focusing instead on expanding and safeguarding reproductive options that women can pursue for themselves without putting others at risk. If Taiwan is to remain true to its democratic principles, it cannot sacrifice women’s rights and autonomy in the pursuit of demographic goals.
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