BY DUFFUS, KIRCH & SKIV

INTODUCED POLICY IN 1979 AFTER WITNESSING EXPONENTIAL POPULATION GROWTH WHICH THREATENED FOOD AND WATER SUPPLY CHINA WILL PRESS AHEAD WITH ITS CONTROVERSIAL FAMILY PLANNING SYSTEM TO KEEP ITS POPULATION UNDER 1.3 BILLION SPECIAL ATTENTION WOULD BE DIRECTED AT RURAL AREAS AND THE MIGRANT POPULATION WHERE MANY COUPLES HAVE MANAGED TO EVADE PROSECUTION BY BRIBERY OR BY MOVING URBAN DWELLERS CAN ONLY HAVE ONE CHILD PER COUPLE RURAL DWELLERS ARE ALLOWED TWO CHILDREN, ETHNIC GROUPS SUCH AS MONGOLS AND TIBETANS ARE PERMITTED 2-3 CHILDREN

We should give priority to family planning in rural areas an DAMONG thee floating population and combine family-planning with efforts to assist farmers to shake off poverty China’s countryside has been left behind by country’s rapid economic progress 80% of population live in countryside

There is an oversupply of labour in the countryside (bad) Minimising population growth is seen as a means of ASSURING a higher standard of living Per-capita income of rural residents rose 9% last year to the EQUIVALENT of $229 but was still less than half of city dwellers’ avg. of $518 Government has asked for increased number of OFFICALS to control rural- urban migration, as social problems have occurred Offering of special loans to assist poor individuals, local authorities to increase anti-poverty funds

When the government started its anti-natalist policy (‘later- longer-fewer’), fertility in China declined more rapidly than ever before. fig. 1 shows total fertility rates, it projects rates of child bearing into the future and tells us the avg. No. of children each woman will have if the current behavior continues in the future

Here is the age distribution for the whole country from the 1990 census. Each point shows the no. of persons at a given single year of age Every time the point moves to the right we are getting 1 year older. The point for age zero reflects the no. of births to the population during the year When we die the point moves down, this is very slight at younger ages as mortality risks are low At older ages mortality risks are high From the graph we can see that there will be an increase in the no. of persons aged 35+ in coming decades.

The growth pattern in the cities is very different from that in the rural areas Figure 5 shows that the no. of persons under age 20 is about two thirds the no. aged There will be a large increase of older persons in the cities, as well as in the country as a whole. In the cities however, increase will be cancelled out by declines in no. of younger persons Natural increase will not grow much in the next 40 years Therefore 400 million new persons will be born into rural areas, we can look more deeply into this by looking at fig. 6 a map of population densities

There is an enormous concentration of Chinese population to the east of the picture Very dense parts indicate strained additional population This is an area in which traditional Chinese agriculture can be practiced The empty spaces to north and west can not support this agriculture, therefore they are sparsely settled Most of the future population will increase where the population is concentrated already, therefore growth will occur in agrarian China

China and India-Pakistan-Bangladesh all dominate the world population Current demographic situation says they will all add roughly a billion persons to the world population over the next half century Most of the additional population will be born into rural china in which most of the labour force is engaged in agriculture Agricultural workers as a % of labour force drops with development from way over half to under 10% - a similar decline in demand can be expected for china China over the next half century needs a modern economy on the scale of US or Europe to accommodate future population growth as it can not be accommodated by agriculture China may develop by ‘exporting’ to the more developed parts of the country Other opportunities may come from expanding consumer market, but this will remain much smaller than the whole country