BEIJING (Web Desk) – Faced with a poor response to the limited relaxation of China’s one-child per couple policy that permits a second child in selected cases, Premier Li Keqiang today said further improvements will be considered to make it more appealing and ease the country’s demographic crisis.
“(We will) make improvements and adjustments to the policy in accordance with legal procedures,” Li told his annual media briefing here without giving a specific time frame.
Li said authorities are currently conducting comprehensive reviews on the implementation of the birth policy which now allows couples to have two children if either parent is an only child.
China, the world’s most populous country, first introduced its family planning policy in the late 1970s to rein in surging population by limiting most urban couples to one child and most rural couples to two if the first child was a girl.
But the policy ran into criticism in recent years as China’s old age population grew considerably creating a demographic crisis.
Chinese authorities had in the past defended the country’s previous one-child policy, saying it had prevented around 400 million people from being added to China’s population.
But the policy did lead to a number of social problems over the years. Earlier reports said China’s labour force had decreased by 3.45 million year on year in 2012, marking the first “absolute decrease” since China’s reform and opening up in 1979.
As of 2013, the number of Chinese people aged 60 or above exceeded 202 million, 8.53 million more than in 2012 and already accounting for 15% of the total population, up 0.6 percentage points.
Gender imbalance is another side effect of the one-child policy, as a result of Chinese parents’ preference for boys.
