China set to report its first population drop in five decades
Beijing recorded its lowest number of births in 2020, official data has revealed, with an expert saying that the capital city’s population could start shrinking from 2022, and China’s by 2027.
The change in Beijing’s demographics, a city of more than 21 million people, is an indication that the number of people in China could start to decline in six years, a report in the tabloid Global Times said on Wednesday. An expert quoted in the report also suggested that India could replace China as the world’s most populous country, perhaps even by next year.
The number of newborns in Beijing hit a new low in a decade in 2020, decreasing by about 32,000 to 100,368 as compared to 2019. Not just Beijing, a dozen cities in eastern China’s Zhejiang and southern China’s Guangdong provinces have also reported the numbers of newborns in 2020 hitting a new low in the past six to 10 years.
The state media report comes a day after the London-based Financial Times, citing sources, said that China is poised to report its first population decline in five decades following a once-in-a-decade census, which was completed last December.
The FT report said the latest census figures are expected to show China’s population slipping to less than 1.4 billion.
The statistics from the new
census were expected to be released earlier this year but have been delayed, possibly because of the complexities that have emerged around the population figure.
The population figure is very sensitive, and will not be published until government departments have a consensus on the data and its implications, the Financial Times added, citing its sources.
A population drop will add pressure on Beijing to roll out measures to encourage couples to have more children and avert an irreversible decline, it said.
Overall, the number of babies born in China fell by 580,000 to 14.65 million in 2019 and the birth rate of 10.48 per thousand was the lowest since 1949, when present methods of collating data began, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.
The two-child policy implemented from 2016 has failed to make an impact on the low birth rates.
Speaking to Global Times, Huang Wenzheng, a demography expert from the Beijingbased think-tank Centre for China and Globalisation, said that the narrowing gap between newborns and deaths indicated that the capital city may see more deaths than newborns starting 2022, or a natural negative growth in population.
Huang said that would impede the capital’s economic development.
“…Beijing’s figures indicated that China’s total population will soon start to decline, which may come before 2027.”
“A soon-to-decline population is predicted by demographers, which would allow India to replace China as the world’s most populous country, perhaps in 2022, if not this year,” Huang said.