China will maintain its family planning policy to keep a low
birth rate over the next five years, but more efforts will be made
to improve population quality and structure, a senior Chinese
population official told the Beijing-based Study
Times.
"The current family planning policy must be kept basically
stable, a fundamental measure to cope with the fourth baby boom (in
the next five years)," said Zhang Weiqing, director of the National
Population and Family Planning Commission.
Since the initiation of the family planning policy in the early
1970s, China has successfully brought its rapid growing population
under control during 1970-1995 and achieved a low birth level
during 1995-2005, preventing over 400 million births.
But many challenges remain, said Zhang, as China will see its
total population, working-age population and aging population all
reach their peaks in the middle of this century.
The rising male-to-female ratio and the world's largest
migrating population have posed serious questions to the
government's management capacity and social stability.
"The major reason for China's rising sex ratio is the entrenched
concept of 'boys are better than girls'. The direct reason is the
abuse of B-ultrasound technology. Does the imbalance have something
to do with family planning? Yes, but there is no direct
connection," said Zhang.
The Republic of Korea, India and China's Taiwan all have the
problem of a rising sex ratio, but they do not have strict birth
control policies. Chinese cities also practice a stricter family
planning policy than rural areas, but do not see the sex ratio
rising, he said.
"Therefore, adjusting the family planning policy is not a
fundamental solution to dealing with a rising sex ratio," he
said.
Experts warned that China has seen 117 boys born for every 100
girls, far beyond the normal ratio of 100 females to 104-107
males.
"To keep the current low birth rate stable, the countryside is
the focus that requires hard efforts," said Zhang, urging the
further improvement of policies favorable to families practicing
family planning as part of the campaign for building a new
socialist countryside.
China's current family planning policy will remain fundamentally
the same although there will be minor changes according to future
needs.
Zhang said the reform of the family planning policy should
follow the principle of "remaining stable overall and carrying out
minor changes in line with local conditions" to prevent population
growth from bouncing back by a large margin.
The current 1.8 gross fertility rate is a proper level for
China's population growth, he said, stressing that the population
policy, if incorrect, would have an irreversible impact on
socioeconomic development.
China's family planning policy is not a 'one-child' policy, he
said, adding that an urban couple, if both husband and wife are the
only child of their families, can give birth to a second child and
farmers in many provinces are allowed to have one more if their
first child is a girl.
Rural families in Yunnan, Qinghai, and Hainan provinces, and the
Ningxia and Xinjiang autonomous regions can have two children. And
there is no limitation whatsoever to rural families in Tibet, he
said.
Instead, China gives more attention to improving its population
quality, first by setting up a national birth defect intervention
and monitoring network to ensure that every family can give birth
to healthy kids.
The government should lead society in creating a social
atmosphere of "women are equal to men", crack down on illegal
pre-natal gender selection, abortion based on sex preference and
deserting baby girls, he said.
Meanwhile, the government should gradually reform its household
registration system to enable the migrant population to have access
to urban services, set up a social security net for migrant rural
workers.
(Xinhua News Agency April 23, 2006)