Decrease in firstborns blamed for falling birth rate
A prominent demographer and government adviser is calling for more work to be done to encourage couples to have their first child, amid persistent fears that China’s shrinking population and other demographic challenges could have profound social and economic implications.
“The decrease and delay in having firstborn children is the main reason for the falling birth rate,” said He Dan, director of the China Population and Development Research Centre, under the National Health Commission.
“Some local governments overly focus their policies on reward and support for the two-child and three-child families, while the birth of the first child – the foundation of maintaining and improving the overall fertility level – is ignored,” her article, published in the latest issue of Population and Health magazine, said.
China’s population declined by 850,000 last year, marking the first fall in six decades. The United Nations in April said India was on the precipice of overtaking China as the most populous country.
China’s firstborn fertility rate fell from 0.7 in 2019 to 0.5 in 2022, and the average age of women having their first child increased from 26.4 to 27.4, indicating fewer families were opting to have any babies, and further dragging down the birth rates for second and third children.
“This will not only inhibit the willingness of families to have their first child, it will also have an adverse effect on [families’] willingness to have more children, and ultimately hinder the realisation of an ideal fertility level,” He said.
With births falling, and an accelerating ageing crisis becoming prominent, China abolished its one-child policy in 2016 in favour of a two-child policy, then further relaxed its family-planning restrictions in 2021 by allowing for a third child.
Since then, authorities have rolled out financial incentives to encourage couples to have kids.
But a number of cities, including Harbin in Heilongjiang and Jinan in Shandong, have offered childcare subsidies only to families who have a second or third child, omitting rewards and support for firstborns.
Last year, Jiangsu became the first to help firms cover the maternity leave pay provided to women who have a second or third child.
But the demographer argued such measures focusing only on second and third births reflected local authorities’ skewed interpretation of the central government’s population-boosting directives.
“It is not only difficult for [these types of] policies to motivate births, they could also bring about the fragmentation of the policies and inequalities between children born at different orders.”
She urged the country to roll out pronatalist policies that were non-discriminatory of the order in which a child was born, and to pay more attention to improving the experience of first-time parents, such as avoiding the policies that rewarded them only if they had multiple children.
The expert also suggested improving birth insurance, childcare subsidies and other financial support to families with children, as well as providing more support and social services to university students who wanted to start families.