HONG KONG: China’s population has slowed significantly and is expected to start to shrink ahead of 2025, the state backed Global Times reported, citing a senior health official.
Birth data released late on Sunday showed that the number of new births in 2021 was the lowest in decades in several provinces.
The number of births in central Hunan province fell below 500,000 for the first time in nearly 60 years, the Global Times said. Only China’s southern Guangdong province has had more than 1 million new births, it said.
China is battling to reverse a rapid shrinkage in natural population growth as many young people opt not to have children due to factors including the high cost and work pressure.
China’s population is expected to start to shrink in 2021-2025, the Global Times said, citing Yang Wenzhuang, head of population and family affairs at the National Health Commission.
A change in China’s laws last year to allow women to have three children has not helped, with many women saying the change comes too late and they have insufficient job security and gender equality.
In 1980, China imposed a policy limiting most families to one child each to arrest a runaway population growth that made the country the most populous nation on earth.
The policy ended in 2016 after a 2010 census showed the proportion of young Chinese shrinking as the elderly population grew.
As a result, demographers warned that China’s choke on family size threatened the future of the world’s fastest-growing major economy as fewer people are left to pay and care for a graying population.
As of 2021, China remained the most populous country with 1.4 billion people, but India was fast catching up with 1.36 billion. A recent UN report had forecast India's population to surpass China's in 2023.
The United States was a far third with 329 million people, Indonesia was fourth at 266 million, and Pakistan 5th with 220.8 million.
Rounding up the 6th to 10 places were Brazil, 211.5 million; Nigeria, 206 million; Bangladesh, 168.5 million; Russia, 146.7 million; and Mexico, 126.5 million.
