CV NEWS FEED // After promising more policies to encourage fertility, China has also announced that it will encourage urbanization, which some experts argue will counteract any pro-fertility policies.
A Reuters article analyzed how the two policies counteract each other, as urbanization tends to have a negative effect on birth rates.
“Given the pace of population decline and ageing in China, the impact of the fast-paced, expensive city life on birth rates should be treated with more urgency by Beijing, demographers say,” the article states.
The push for urbanization “overlooks basic demographic theory. In the cities, people have fewer children due to high housing costs, limited space, expensive education, and because they spend most of their day at work,” the article states.
Part of the concern in China is that the country “is rapidly running out of mothers.”
According to Reuters, “The number of women of reproductive age, defined by the United Nations as 15-to-49, is set to drop by more than two-thirds to under 100 million by the end of the century.”
There is also a dropping fertility rate, which some experts blame on factors of urbanization like pollution and job-related stress. In the 1980s, the country’s infertility rate was 2%. It’s now at 18%, compared with 15% globally.
However, according to the article, there is hope for China in its rural populations. In rural areas, the fertility rate in 2020 was 1.54, compared with the nationwide average of 1.3. Moreover, the urbanization rate of China is only 65%, lower than the 80-90% of Japan and South Korea.
Reuters reported that demographers remark that improving public services or “liberalizing” land rights in rural areas would improve living standards in those parts of the country. These measures would raise birth rates and therefore grow the economy more than urbanization would.
