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Updated January 31st, 2023 at 12:56 IST

China allows unmarried couples in Sichuan to have unlimited children amid low birth rates

Due to the shrinking of China population in China's Sichuan province, the Chinese authorities have allowed as many children as they want.

Reported by: Saumya Joshi
Xi Jinping
Image: AP | Image:self
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In order to bolster China's birth rate amid the declining population, couples in Sichuan province will be allowed to have as many children as they want. It is to mention that China, which had introduced a one-child policy in 1979, scrapped the controversial rule in 2016. In 2022, the population in China fell for the first time in 60 years.

Under this new change in the policy, unmarried individuals in Sichuan will also be allowed to raise children, BBC reported. Earlier, a ban was levied on single women registering for birth.

Shift in China's population policy

Under its controversial one-child policy, China used to fine families for breaking rules, and even in somecase people lost their jobs due to restrictive rules. This scrapped policy favored boys over girls which led to forced abortions in China. However, scrapping the 1979 one-child policy of China did not help and failed to halt the decline in the birth rate. This was followed by a major rise in deaths for the first time last year in China.

The dip in the birth rate in China has raised concerns for the Chinese authorities and now they have come up with a "no limit on the number of children" policy in 'Sichuan'. The province is located in the southwest of the country and has 80 million people. Amid the population decline, Chinese President Xi Jinping has made boosting birth rates a priority and the government started offering a relaxation in taxes and better healthcare facilities for pregnant women.

"We will establish a policy system to boost birth rates and pursue a proactive national strategy in response to population ageing," Xi was reported as saying to a delegation of 2,300 people at the Communist Party Congress in Beijing in October 2022. 

Decline in China's population

China's population has declined in recent years amid an aging society and plunging birth rate, reported Associated Press. The country had 8,50,000 fewer people at the end of 2022 compared to the previous year, as per the National Bureau of Statistics report. While calculating China's population, it only calculated the population of mainland China and excluded  Hong Kong, Macao, and self-governing Taiwan as well as foreign residents. 

That left a total of 1.411.75 billion, with 9.56 million births against 10.41 million deaths, the bureau had said.

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Published January 31st, 2023 at 12:49 IST

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