Rural couples in Shanghai, Tianjin and five provinces have been entitled to have a second child if either of them is the only child of their families, the country's deputy population planning chief and a lawmaker confirmed on Tuesday.

"As per changes in demographic, economic and social landscapes, we have improved our policies regarding child bearing in recent years," Wang Pei'an, vice-minister of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, said on the sidelines of the ongoing session of the National People's Congress, which opened on Tuesday in Beijing.

In his Government Work Report at the opening of the legislature's annual meeting on Tuesday morning, Premier Wen Jiabao vowed to "progressively improve the government population policy" and "adhere to the basic State policy on family planning".

The State policy, instigated three decades ago, is not tantamount to a "one-child" policy, said Wang Xu, a national legislator.

Already, rural families can have a second child if the firstborn is a girl, and both rural and urban couples can have a second child if they are both the only child of their families.

Rural couples in Liaoning, Jilin, Jiangsu, Anhui and Fujian provinces then joined their rural cousins in Shanghai and Tianjin municipalities by being allowed to give birth to a second child if a husband or wife is an only child, they said.