Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2015;69 Suppl 1(sup1):S97-105.
doi: 10.1080/00324728.2014.982898.

Fertility in China: An uncertain future

Stuart Basten  1 , Quanbao Jiang
Affiliations

Fertility in China: An uncertain future

Stuart Basten et al. Popul Stud (Camb). 2015.

Abstract

As one of the world's two population 'billionaires', the future of China's population is truly of global significance. With its very low fertility and a rapidly ageing population, it might appear that the country's famous (or notorious) family planning restrictions are somewhat anachronistic. Here, we explore the process of reform seen over the past three decades and, most recently, in late 2013. We suggest that the popular notion that the family planning restrictions are acting as a pressure valve suppressing a pent-up demand for childbearing, particularly in rural China, is likely to be inaccurate. We also suggest that further reform of the restrictions will not solve the problems of population ageing or many of the other issues widely associated with the restrictions. We conclude that the prospects for further reform are wide-ranging, but likely to be beset by many challenges.

Keywords: China; family planning policy; fertility; one-child policy.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Projected total population size by key age groups, China
Note: The constant variant implies a fixed TFR of 1.63 to 2100, while the low variant essentially entails a further marginal decrease and stabilization at around 1.3–1.4. Source: Based on the UN World Population Prospects: The 2012 Revision (UNPD 2013).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. 163.com Renda weiyuan: zhi fangkai dandu shuangdu sheng ertai youshi gongping [Member of the National People’s Congress: Unfair to allow families to have two children only if one parent is only child or both parents ore only children] news.163.com . 2013 http://news.163.com/13/1225/02/9GTJIKFK00014AED.html Available.
    1. Bai Jianfeng. Jiedu dandu lianghai zhengce [Elucidating policy permitting couples to have a second birth if one spouse is an only child] people.com.cn . 2014 http://ft.people.com.cn/directList.do?fid=141 Available.
    1. Basten Stuart. Family planning restrictions and a generation of excess males: analysis of national and provincial data from the 2010 Census of China. Oxford Centre for Population Research Working Paper No. 59 2012
    1. Basten Stuart, Gu Baochang. Childbearing preferences, reform of family planning restrictions and the Low Fertility Trap in China. Oxford Centre for Population Research Working Paper No. 61 2013
    1. Basten Stuart, Verropoulou Georgia. ‘Maternity migration’ and the increased sex ratio at birth in Hong Kong SAR. Population Studies. 2013;67(3):323–334. - PubMed

Publication types

LinkOut - more resources