CHINA
China faces labour shortage
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
The workshop of the world - China - is running short on labour. It's explained - in part - by the country's policy of one child per family. This report was prepared in Shanghai for (Report: J. Zylberman, C.Isoux)
Thursday, November 29, 2007
By Reuters
BEIJING, Nov 20 (Reuters) - China has vowed fresh efforts to
strengthen rural family planning, warning that measures to
control population growth in the vast countryside face
"unprecedented challenges".
With the world's biggest population straining scarce
resources, China has enforced rules to restrict family size since
the 1970s. Rules vary but usually limit families to one or, in
the countryside, two children.
China credits the sweeping campaign to cajole or force
couples to avoid "excess births" with keeping its population down
to about 1.3 billion and helping to maximise the benefits of
economic growth.
But in tens of thousands of villages those policies were
strained by growing mobility, lack of a social security net and
"traditional" ideas about family size, the National Population
and Family Planning Commission warned, according to the Xinhua
news agency.
Mobile families can avoid official checks, and those with
money can pay fines or bribes to have more children.
"At present, rural population and family planning work face
unprecedented challenges," the commission and over a dozen other
agencies warned in a document that called rural family planning
"the number one tough task under heaven".
"Stabilising low birth rates in the countryside is an
extremely arduous task."
In past years, China has been seeking to soften its draconian
and often controversial family control policies, including forced
abortions.
But local officials remain under intense pressure to keep
numbers down -- leading to skewed statistics, corruption and
sometimes brutality.
In May, thousands of villagers rioted in Guangxi region in
the country's south, ransacking government buildings, burning
cars and clashing with police, after being fined for breaching
the one-child policy.
The document urged officials to use rewards and encouragement
to make population controls more "harmonious".
Rural families who abided by controls should receive
financial benefits promised to them, including support in old age
or when a child dies, the document said.
Efforts to spread old-age pensions to the countryside should
also focus on families with one child or two daughters, it added.
Tens of millions of rural migrants working in towns and
cities needed better access to family planning and medical
services, it also said.
The government also promised less top-down control of family
planning policies. "Protect the interests of the public, and
implement self-administration, self-servicing, self-education and
self-oversight by the public," the rules said.
strengthen rural family planning, warning that measures to
control population growth in the vast countryside face
"unprecedented challenges".
With the world's biggest population straining scarce
resources, China has enforced rules to restrict family size since
the 1970s. Rules vary but usually limit families to one or, in
the countryside, two children.
China credits the sweeping campaign to cajole or force
couples to avoid "excess births" with keeping its population down
to about 1.3 billion and helping to maximise the benefits of
economic growth.
But in tens of thousands of villages those policies were
strained by growing mobility, lack of a social security net and
"traditional" ideas about family size, the National Population
and Family Planning Commission warned, according to the Xinhua
news agency.
Mobile families can avoid official checks, and those with
money can pay fines or bribes to have more children.
"At present, rural population and family planning work face
unprecedented challenges," the commission and over a dozen other
agencies warned in a document that called rural family planning
"the number one tough task under heaven".
"Stabilising low birth rates in the countryside is an
extremely arduous task."
In past years, China has been seeking to soften its draconian
and often controversial family control policies, including forced
abortions.
But local officials remain under intense pressure to keep
numbers down -- leading to skewed statistics, corruption and
sometimes brutality.
In May, thousands of villagers rioted in Guangxi region in
the country's south, ransacking government buildings, burning
cars and clashing with police, after being fined for breaching
the one-child policy.
The document urged officials to use rewards and encouragement
to make population controls more "harmonious".
Rural families who abided by controls should receive
financial benefits promised to them, including support in old age
or when a child dies, the document said.
Efforts to spread old-age pensions to the countryside should
also focus on families with one child or two daughters, it added.
Tens of millions of rural migrants working in towns and
cities needed better access to family planning and medical
services, it also said.
The government also promised less top-down control of family
planning policies. "Protect the interests of the public, and
implement self-administration, self-servicing, self-education and
self-oversight by the public," the rules said.
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