ANOTHER ONE ON THE WAY
Recent relaxation of the one-child policy has huge demographic implications for China and the world, report Joseph Catanzaro and Yan Yiqi in Zhoushan, Zhejiang province, and Li Aoxue in Beijing.
In an otherwise unremarkable hospital waiting room in Zhoushan, the first city in China to move away from the onechild policy, an expectant father places his hand on the protruding curve of his wife’s belly. “This will be our second child,” said Le Zhangfeng as he flashes a proud smile.
Those simple words, so frequently uttered elsewhere in the world, have a special gravity in China, where for almost 40 years more than 60 percent of the population has been subject to a one-child policy.
Le’s wife Zhou Na’s second baby is the harbinger of a new generation, newly allowed after family planning rules were relaxed in November.
“We just love children,” he said Le, a tall and quiet 31-year-old real estate agent. “I think the more the merrier.”
Whether most eligible Chinese couples share his sentiment and opt for a second child is an open question. The answer will have a profound impact not only on individual households but on the world.
In the halls of power in Beijing and in corporate boardrooms, the gentle bulge pressing against the front of 23-year-old Zhou’s shirt represents more than just another new life. It is the tip of a demographic iceberg that can make or break more than just China’s fortunes. For businesses and economies around the globe, Chinese babies and balance sheets have become inextricably linked.
The one-child policy, rolled out across the nation in the late 1970s in a bid to speed development and increase per capita income, is estimated to have prevented some 400 million births at a time when it was reasoned China could least afford them.
But in 2012, the world’s most populous nation and second-largest economy saw an alarming decline of 3.45 million working-age Chinese, the result of a plummeting birthrate and a growing bulge of senior citizens. With that pattern expected to continue for the next 20 years, economists and demographers warn that relatively fewer workers will stunt economic growth as labor scarcity sparks wage hikes and inflation drives businesses to cheaper pastures.
Currently, about 14 percent of the population has reached or passed the male retirement age of 60. Conservative projections suggest that by the early 2030s, some 400 million people — more than the projected total population of the US — will be 60 years or older.
Wang Peian, deputy director of the National Health and Family Planning Commission, said China’s workingage population will shrink by an average of about 8 million annually from 2023 as the aging problem continues to worsen.
The latest census figures (2010) show an average of 1.54 births per Chinese woman, well below the estimated six children per woman in the early 1970s. It’s also below the replacement rate of 2.1 births.
For China’s manufacturing- and export-based economy, these combined factors present a serious threat to future prosperity. Unlike many other nations around the world that are also grappling with declining births and aging, China is getting old before reaching its prime.
Professor Kerry Brown, executive director of Sydney University’s China Studies Center, is unequivocal in his assessment of the problem: “The scale of it is extraordinary, and the speed of it. It’s kind of like a meteor striking the planet.”
Brown said the erosion of China’s working-age demographic will create a labor-supply problem that will have “an inflationary impact on Chinese, and therefore global, wage levels”.
Welcome news
A world away from discussions of demographics, Le and Zhou received some welcome news on Nov 19. In a major policy shift, the Third Plenary session of the 18th Communist Party of China Central Committee announced that an estimated 20 million couples would be eligible to have a second child, provided at least one parent was an only child. After the announcement, Le and Zhou’s relatively sleepy island home of Zhoushan became the first region in China to move forward.
But for the couple, global speculation about whether the new policy would effectively address China’s demographic woes had been superseded by a more personal matter: Zhou’s accidental second pregnancy.
Before November, that would have been a problem. Now, instead of facing a crippling fine for breaching family planning rules, Zhou is happily six months along. Her unintentional head start puts her among a very small group of pregnant women whose newborns will be the first nationwide to be delivered under the new policy.
“I feel really lucky,” Zhou said. “There are people I know who want a second child who don’t qualify.”
Located just off the coast of Zhejiang province, Zhoushan is the largest island metropolis in a sprawling archipelago. With a population of around 970,000 people spread primarily across 12 of the more than 1,000 islands in the chain, it’s considered sparsely populated by Chinese standards. It is a popular holiday destination, a lively trading port and a marine industry hub.
It’s also a demographic time bomb.
For 11 consecutive years, Zhoushan has recorded negative population growth. By the end of last year, people aged 60 years or older made up 20.32 percent of the population. Current projections show that by
We wanted to have a second because we love children. And I think one is not enough.” ZHOU NA MOTHER IN ZHOUSHAN
2030, if the problem is left unchecked, a staggering 40 percent of the local population will be 60 years or older. And if that comes to pass, the number of retirees in Zhoushan will rank 16 percentage points higher than the already alarming projected national average of 24 percent.
In short, if China is beginning to brace for a gray tidal wave, Zhoushan is in line to take the brunt of it.
Weather vane
As a microcosm of the demographic problem facing modern China, Zhoushan serves as a national weather vane indicating how Chinese are responding to the new policy. So far, Le and Zhou’s enthusiasm has been slow to catch on.
In the month following the policy shift, some 3,000 locals approached Zhoushan’s Municipal Health Bureau to inquire about having a second child. But that apparent interest has yet to translate into many couples who actually apply for the second child, the department’s deputy director, Yang Ya’er, said.
“They are more rational than excited,” Yang said. “They did not show up eager to get pregnant. They came to learn more about the policy — to have a full understanding — and to make sure they are eligible. It doesn’t mean they are going to have a baby right away.”
As of January, 87 women in Zhoushan had sought permission to have a second child, and 41 were approved after the completion of a 30-day application process. “The conclusion is that not that many people are rushing into having a second child here,” Yang said. “That means the low birth rate will not change overnight.”
Does the slow takeup in Zhoushan suggest that women in China generally don’t want a second child? Not necessarily, according to Mao Yafei, deputy head of Zhoushan Women’s Hospital. At a consultation clinic to advise couples about having another baby, staff have seen a steady stream of women older than 30 who are interested but want to assess the health risks first.
Li Jianmin, a demographer with Nankai University in Tianjin, said surveys show that about 60 percent of eligible people polled would consider having a second baby. Such figures have given birth to a number of theories at home and abroad about how effective the new policy will be as an agent for demographic change.
Nationally, officials estimate the policy change will generate about 2 million more babies each year for the next five years, on top of the current 16 million annually.
Mao said what she’s seeing in Zhoushan contradicts a line being put forward by international pundits suggesting that China’s labor force problem will be exacerbated in the short term by women leaving the workplace after having a second child.
“Women of an older age are asking questions about whether it’s safe to work during pregnancy and how quickly they will recover so they can return to work,” she said.
Public servant Zhao Zhenghao, 34, is one of the locals now planning and saving for two children. Ducking into a local Zhoushan restaurant, he said his wife, who is hoping to become pregnant with their first child this year, will not give up her career but might adjust her working hours.
“My wife will not give up her job,” he said. “She can have shorter hours, and so can I.”
He dismissed another view commonly bandied about by foreign sinologists: that Chinese people of childbearing age will not be able to afford a second baby because they will need to support two sets of parents and possibly even grandparents.
“Two children won’t cost much more than one,” he said. Besides, he said, “Both of our parents have high pensions. They earn more than we do now. I am typical of my generation in the cities. Most of our parents have jobs and pensions and can support themselves.”
Wang said the issue is less about Chinese couples being able to afford the basic costs of raising a second child than it is about whether they can afford to give the children the topnotch education and financial support that has become typical in the past three decades.
Another factor is lifestyle: Many Chinese will not want to sacrifice their personal prosperity for children.
Moreover, a substantial chunk — 37 percent — of China’s population, mostly in rural areas, has long been exempt from the one-child policy, and most already chose to have a second child. It is the urban-dwelling, modern Chinese women who will need to have more children if the plummeting birthrate is to be meaningfully addressed, Wang said. Current data are not encouraging. “More than 50 percent of the population now lives in urban areas,” Wang said. “The census reported the average number of children born in cities as 0.7 percent — not even one child per woman.”
Back in Zhoushan, Le and Zhou are coy about discussing their finances and divulging details about whether both will continue working full time as real estate agents after the birth of their second child.
Slightly embarrassed at the attention, they seem bemused by the thought that their baby might represent a first among China’s 1.3 billion people.
For Zhou, it’s not about statistics or changes in demographics. A simple equation is all that matters: “We wanted to have a second because we love children,” she said. “And I think one is not enough.”