China Birth Rate To Remain Low, Pledges President
Alexa Olesen
BEIJING - China will maintain the strict family planning policy it imposed a generation ago to keep the birth rate low and the economy growing, President Hu Jintao said in remarks before new census data are released.
But demographers who have been advocating changes to the country's so-called one-child policy responded to Hu's speech with counterintuitive optimism, suggesting that Hu's decision to publicly address family planning now meant there was fresh debate among the leadership about how best to manage it.
There has been growing speculation among Chinese media, experts and ordinary people about whether the government would soon relax the policy - introduced in 1980 as a temporary measure to curb surging population growth- and allow more people to have two children. Currently, most urban couples are limited to one child and rural families to two.
That anticipation has grown despite the fact that Hu's comments, made at a Communist Party meeting of top leaders convened to discuss population issues, mirrored other official remarks in recent months.
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