China’s population has decreased for the first time in 60 years as a result of the record low national birth rate of 6.77 births per 1,000 women.
The population decreased by 850,000 from 2021 to 2022, reaching 1.4118 billion.
Years of dropping birth rates in China prompted a plethora of efforts to reverse the
trend.
However, it entered what one official called a “period of negative population growth” seven years after abandoning the one-child policy.
According to data issued on Tuesday by China’s National Bureau of Statistics, the birth rate in 2022 decreased from 7.52 in 2021.
Last year, there were more deaths than births for the first time since 1976. China
recorded the highest death rate per 1,000 people since 1976, rising to 7.37 from 7.18 the year before.
An impending demographic catastrophe, which would eventually reduce China’s labor force and raise the cost of healthcare and other social security benefits, had been predicted by earlier government data.
China’s population was expanding at its slowest rate in decades, according to results of an every ten years census that was revealed in 2021.
Other Asian developed economies, like South Korea and Japan, have been slowing
economically due to an aging population and declining birth rates.
The contentious one-child policy, which was implemented in 1979 to restrict population growth, has played a significant role in shaping China’s demographic trends over time.
Families who broke the restrictions were penalized and, in some circumstances, even
fired. The strategy also resulted in forced abortions and a reportedly skewed gender
ratio for boys starting in the 1980s, in a culture that historically favors males over girls.
In 2016, the rule was changed to allow married couples to have two children. The
Chinese government has recently provided additional incentives, including tax breaks and improved maternal healthcare, to stop or at least reduce the decline in the birth rate.
The reason these policies did not result in a sustained rise in births, according to
experts, is that they did not also make any attempt to reduce the strain of childcare,
such as by providing greater support for working moms or expanding access to
schooling.
Chinese President Xi Jinping called increasing birth rates a top priority in October 2022.
In response to the aging population of the nation, Mr. Xi declared during the once every five years Communist Party Congress in Beijing that his administration will “pursue a proactive national policy.
