NEWS//China population sags

China's 2020 census shows that its population has grown, but at its slowest pace in decades.

Between 2000 and 2010, the population growth rate was 0.57%. Between 2010 and 2020, the average annual growth rate was 0.53%. China’s population stands at 1.412 billion.

The births in 2020 fell from 14.65 million in 2019 to 12 million. China’s fertility rate was 1.3 children per woman. In order for China’s population not to decline, the fertility rate must be above 2.1 children per woman.

According to Ning Jizhe, commissioner of the National Bureau of Statistics, “The census data also show some structural contradictions facing the country’s population development, such as the decline in the size of the working-age population and women of childbearing age, the deepening of the aging degree, the decline in the total fertility rate, and the downturn in the number of births,” said NBS commissioner Ning Jizhe.

The census findings will pressure the government to increase its efforts to encourage couples to have more babies.

Sources: South China Morning Post, BBC, CNBS, CNN