Population Growth in China is one of the most serious problems that the Beijing administration needs to tackle. How does the government plan to solve what could be the biggest problem for China’s future?
Since 1978, China has been implementing a one child policy law that officially restricts the number of children married urban couples are allowed to have. The law was created by the Chinese government to alleviate social, economic, and environmental problems in China, and authorities claim that the policy has prevented 400 million births from 1979 to 2011. The prevention of births, so policy makers have claimed, have resulted in less pressure on worldwide food supplies and in less pollution in major Chinese cities.
Despite the prevention of hundreds of millions of births and the so called success that this law entails, the policy has created various problems for China and perhaps caused irreversible damage to the structure of Population Growth in China: The UN Population Division has projected that by 2050 the elderly population in China (above the age of 60) will be 31% of the total population. By contrast, the proportion of children and young adults (below the age of 20) will only be 21% of the population.
Watch: Population Growth in China
Furthermore, China, like many other Asian countries, has a long tradition of son preference. The commonly accepted explanation for son preference is that sons in rural families are thought to be more helpful in farm work. Both rural and urban populations have economic and traditional incentives, including widespread remnants of Confucianism, to prefer sons over daughters. Sons are preferred as they provide the primary financial support for the parents in their retirement, and a son’s parents are typically better cared for than his wife’s. In addition, Chinese traditionally hold that daughters, on their marriage, become primarily a part of the groom’s family.
Confucian tradition and family preferences, combined with the one child policy, have created an acute female shortage in China: the male/female ratio is the highest in the world and stands on 1.13 male /1 female. According to a report by the State Population and Family Planning Commission, in 2020, there will be 30 million more men than women in China; A situation that may lead to social instability.
The problems that the Population Growth in China and the one child policy create (such as a shrinking labor force or larger reliance on government funds) are good reasons for policy makers to be concerned about the future, and they have begun to question the necessity of the one child policy. Wang Yuqing (王玉庆), the deputy director of the CPPCC’s Committee on Natural Resources and the Environment, revealed to local media last month that the department in charge of enforcing the current policy is considering relaxing current rules towards the end of the 12th five year plan (from this year through to the end of 2015).
According to Wang, policy makers are considering whether to make changes to the policy so that families will be able to have a second child, and experts are currently exploring the possibilities of a “two-child policy”. Mr. Wang argued that in a society where children are expected to take care of their elders (based on Confucian tradition), the one-child policy has caused many social problems as the older generation now lacks a sense of social security. Mr. Wang also said that changes to this policy would not lead to a population explosion and that it would also help to relieve concerns about a “greying China.”
On one hand, China is facing the burden of aging population and the decline of its workforce; In order to maintain stable growth and to correct its gender imbalance, China needs to loosen its one-child policy. On the other hand, loosening the one child policy might create more pollution and food shortages. What do you think? Is Population Growth in China a problem?
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Lior Paritzky is the Editor in Chief and Manager of Laowaiblog, an internet platform that provides opinion and views about social phenomena in modern China. Look for Lior on Twitter: Liorpari 
Very informative. I voted Yes in the survey, as I think that if China doesn’t change its ways it will get into serious trouble: Population growth in China means more support from the government and a decrease in the ability to grow economically (less young people are working). I am not even mentioning the social problems that rise from having one child per family…
As a Chinese, the population growth in China and the one child policy have influenced me greatly. I am 20 years old and grew up in a family where I am the only child. Not only I do not have brothers or sisters but all of my friends are like that too. So most of the time I am at home doing homework and studying, and because all of my friends are like me I grew up alone. I don’t feel sorry for myself because this is just how things are here, but after reading this I would be happy to have a brother or a sister
Hi, Xie:
I have grown up in on-child family like you, so I can understand your feeling of being lonely. But I wish you enjoy your time of being student, and with all the support from your parents as well. Once you leave school, you have to struggle alone like others in your peer set.
With pressure of feding family and intensive peer competition, I concern less optimistic about the future of our generation.
Hi Xie,
I can definitely understand the place that you are coming from and the frustration you must feel not being able to experience childhood with siblings. As a westerner, I could never understand how people are willing to accept such a rule – because to me it symbolizes just how the country controls the freedom of people. The right to have children is natural within us all, and the law that prevents the population growth in China is simply an inhumane ruling. I wish you all the best and luck with your life!
It’ s true that China is entering an aging society. Obviously the government is aware of the potentially devastating consequence of population growth in China and they are thinking about adjusting the original policy.
It’s predicted that by the end of the ’12th five year’period, a new policy which allows couples to have two children will be piloted in a few coastal cities and gradually spread througout the country. As with other new policies, experiments are always conducted in prosperous cities such as Shanghai, Guangzhou, where people’s renewed values free them of son preference, and where the high living costs and fierce competition dampen couples’ enthusiasm of having a second child( or even ONE child).
There is a Chinese saying”双管齐下”,meaning work long two lines. I think that’s what the government should do to tackle its population problem. On the one hand, adusting the one-child policy with great tact; on the other hand, improving the social security system. I think more importance should be attached to the latter–at least presently.More young people are needed to take care of the old. But someday not far away they too become the old and need being taken care of..can’t imagine how the young will be able to shoulder their burdens with soaring living costs, without a powerful social security umbrella.
Tracy, I couldn’t agree more. But I don’t think that China is headed in the direction of helping everyone who needs help – we are talking about millions and millions of people who are or will be old, much because of the population growth in China. How can the country, with low numbers of young people, support the old? Where will the money come from?
It’s amazing to me, as a foreigner, because I always thought that one of the most important values for the Chinese people is family (Confucianism). It’s sad to see how this is neglected and how no one will take care of the elderly – all because of government policy – whether right or wrong.
I agree very much with the video. It is evident that the problem of having too many people in China is only more serious when the government limits people’s right to have children. No one knows how many children would have been born without that law (of course more than one per family) – but no one also knows what human intelligence could have invented to create a better life for all the new people who would have been born because of the natural process of population growth in china. Today we are dealing with issues of shortage of food and oil ANYWAY, and we must count on human innovation, creativity and intelligence to come up with solutions that will allow all human beings to live happily on this planet
For those who voted NO in the survey, try not calling your brothers/sisters for a few months. See how you manage…
Well, folks you need to think a little further than your personal satisfaction…
For what I know so far, the US is still ruling the world when it comes to economy; that said, it is obvious that the US will go bankrupt before 2020… Europe will follow within the hour as well as China … Asia … you name it!
Analyses demonstrate that half of the planet will be without food and proper water by 2020, and the whole planet will start to starve by 2046 …
This because of pollution + supply + demand.
Adding more human to the problem will only speed the process! ! !
World’s Financial, Economical & Production systems have to be entirely rebuild before adding more human life to them! ! !
I am Chinese. All of the problems we have in my country are because of too many people! it is hard to get a job, hard to get a taxi, hard to find a cheap apartment. if there was 400 million people more we have no chance to live here!!
Even though I understand Chinese people’s pain – 1.3 billion people is incomprehensible, and population growth in China will inevitably cause a great deal of stress on China’s already damaged eco-system, I still think that on personal level, to grow up without brothers or sisters, and even without cousins or uncles (parents also don’t have siblings) is just horrible
Honestly no one in the West fully understands the consequences of population growth in China. This is a first ever experience, and the population pyramid in the video emphasize how hard it will be for China in the very near future
China are doing the correct thing of the one child policy
Yes they are going to have problems in the near future because the young to old ratio is top heavy but when the old die off it will level off and be normal
What China is doing now is only a prelude to what is to become the future in the west !
The Earth is only a finite size and cannot continue to expand its population growth because there will be mass food, medicine, sanitation, economic, problems where people will be dying in their droves within a 100 years
i think its kinda the right thing to do, i mean.. peoople wikll behiding, and im reading the book The Hidden. and life seems terrible for the childen because they have to hd or they will get shot, population polece will take them away, rallys that caouse death, and more. they cant get married, have there oun children, or make friends..
Um anonymous above me it;s not like the book Hidden, you need to get out of your fantasy±!!!!