“Worried” China ends 36-year-long one-child policy
China will allow all couples to have two children, abandoning its decades-long one-child policy, a communique issued Thursday by the Communist Party of China (CPC) says.
China aims to keep its population at about 1.5 billion Guo Zhenwei, a family-planning official with the National Health and Family Planning Commission, said.
The one-child policy, enacted in 1980, restricts approximately 37 percent of China’s population to one child, with many exceptions and ethnic minorities being exempt.
China relaxed the decades-old policy in 2013 by allowing couples who were themselves only children to have a second child.
Experts say China makes the move for obvious economic reasons.
“The move was a clear sign the government is worried about a shortfall in labour as the country ages and the birth-rate slows,” Matt O’Brien of The Washington Post wrote in an article on Thursday.
