China sees birth decline amid push for 2nd child

BEIJING: The number of births in China fell last year even though the world’s most populous country has relaxed its one-child policy to allow all couples to have two children.

The country saw 17.23 million births in 2017, compared to 17.86 million in the previous year, the head of the National Bureau of Statistics, Ning Jizhe, said on Thursday.

The nation of some 1.4 billion people began to phase out its onechild policy in 2015 in response to concerns about an ageing population and shrinking workforce, prompting the number of births to rise the following year.

While last year marked a decline, - tional Health and Family Planning Commission said in a statement the number of births remained “at a relatively high level.”

The decrease was due to the declining population of women of childbearing age and people’s decision to get married and have children later in life, the commission said.

“Socioeconomic factors have more - ingness to give birth and child-bear costs, lack of childcare services and women’s career development pressure as three major reasons.

While overall births fell, the proportion of newborns born to parents who already had a first percentage points higher than 2016, commission said.