Geography - Population - Case Study - China

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Case Study - China's One Child Policy

The Background

Previous Chinese governments had encouraged people to have a lot of children to increase the country's workforce. However by the 1970s the government realised that current rates of population growth would soon become unsustainable.

By the late 1970's the population had exceeded 1 billion. This was expected to nearly double by 2025

As well as this in the 1970's China was heading towards a famine as they had changed to an industrial economy at the expense of farming meaning they were not produing enough food to feed their rapidly growing population

Therefore plans were put in place to try and stabilise the population at around 1.2 billion by the early 21st Century.

In 1979 China introduced its "One Child Policy"

The Policy

Couples have ask the permission from the government before they are allowed to marry or have children

Women are not allowed to marry until they are 20 and Men 22

Couples are only allowed to have one child.

Incentives

Parents who stick to the policy and only have one child are given lots of government benefits such as family allowances, priority housing and pensions

Parents of one child are also given free education for their first child

Punishments

Parents of more than one child receive no free education for any children

Parents of more than one child get no allowances or pensions and have to pay a fine to the state

Some couples are forces to be sterilises after their first successful baby or forced to abort future pregnancies. Forced, dangerous late term abortions are also not uncommon.

What is actually happening

Family planning education is included in the workplace

Some minority groups are allowed more than one child to allow their population to be sustainable

Changes were made to the policy in the late 1990's to maintain its apparent success

In rural areas some families are allowed to have two children to help work the land and as the population in these areas is too low

Sometimes older women are paid to keep check on couples suspected of having more children, many even accompanying them to their contraception appointments

An edit made to the policy in 2013 allows couples to have 2 children if they are both only children amid fears that the workforce may be too small to support the large number of elderly in the future.

Failures

There are now concerns current population growth will not be able to sustain current rates of economic growth

There are fewer people able to look after the ageing population, putting more pressure on the economy

Local officials and central governments had a lot of control of people private lives

Concerns were raised over a spoilt society, as single children are being over indulged

Chinese society prefers sons over daughters which has lead to many girls being placed in orphanages or allowed to die (female infanticide). China has over 15 million orphans in china with the majority being girls.

Young men are having difficultly finding partners, this could lead to future population problems. There are 60 million more young men than women.

Success

The population has stabilised at around 1.4 billion.

A famine forcasted in the 1970's never occurred and economic development has lifted millions out of poverty