China’s population shrank for the first time last year in more than six decades, official data showed on Tuesday, as the world’s most populated country faces a looming demographic crisis.
The nation of 1.4 billion has seen birth rates plunge to record lows as its workforce ages, in a rapid decline that analysts warn could Stymie economic growth and pile pressure on strained public coffers.
The mainland Chinese population stood at approximately 1,411,750,000 at the end of 2022, Beijing National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) reported on Tuesday, a decrease of 850,000 from the end of the previous year.
The number of births was 9.56 million, the NBS reported, while the number of deaths recorded stood at 10.41 million. The number of men also continued to outnumber the number of women by 722.06 million to 689.69 million
The last time China’s population declined was in the early 1960’s, as the country battled the worst famine in its modern history, a result of the disastrous Mao Zedong agricultural policy known as the Great Leap Forward.
China ended its strict one-child policy- imposed in the 1980s owing to fears of overpopulation- in 2016 and began allowing couples to have three children in 2021.
But that has failed to reverse the demographic decline for a country that has long relied on its vast workforce as a driver of economic growth.
“The population will likely trend down from here in the coming years,” Zhiwie Zhang of Pinpoint Asset Management said.
“China cannot rely on the demographic dividend as a structural driver for economic growth.
“Economic growth will have to depend more on productivity growth, which is driven by government policies,” he added.
Source: Punch, NDTV, Eyewitness News, Al Jazeera, image from Twitter: @onlinelisting