中国考虑放松计划生育政策
国一位高级官员表示，政府正在考虑放松严格的计划生育政策，但此事目前仍处于研讨阶段，短时间内无法定案。根据现行政策，中国大多数城市夫妇只能生育一个孩子。
中国的计划生育政策始于1973年，出台这项政策是为了应对可能导致人口增长失控的生育浪潮。文化大革命期间中国的人口出生率大幅攀升，当时一对夫妇平均生育的子女数达到了5.8个，政府担心这是中国有限的水资源、食品和能源所无法承受的。
如今，中国的总和生育率已降至1.8，低保证人口不出现下降的2.1。许多学者认为，人口出生率降低将来会引发社会问题，因为届时能够纳税并赡养老人的年轻工作人口将会减少。而官员们常常采用高压手段强制执行计划生育法规的做法也受到了批评。越来越多的人因此呼吁改变现行计划生育政策。
路透社(Reuters)援引中国国家人口与计划生育委员会副主任赵白鸽的话说，中国希望逐步调整计划生育政策。她说，自己无法回答现行政策何时会调整、以及如何调整，但表示中国的决策层已经开始重视这一问题。赵白鸽说，官员们打算研究这个问题，但他们不希望人口出生率出现反复。
虽然中国的计划生育政策常被说成是独生子女政策，但实际上这一政策的伸缩余地还是很大的。农村地区的一些夫妇按政策可以生育两个孩子，而农村人口占中国人口的大多数；少数民族和一些贫困地区的人甚至还获准生育更多子女。在城市，如果夫妻双方都是独生子女，他们也可以生育两个孩子。
中国的人口政策不管未来做何调整，都不大可能完全放弃人口控制。国家计生委一年前公布的一份人口政策三年评估报告说，中国无力养活大大高于13亿的人口。报告因而认为，某种形式的人口控制是必要的，不过也表示应使人口控制政策减少强制性，更多建立在正面鼓励的基础上。
中国的人口总量仍在增长。国有媒体去年12月报导说，到2033年中国人口将突破15亿，人口出生率未来五年将显著上升。
Jason Leow
China Mulls Relaxing Strict Family-Planning Policies
China is mulling a relaxation of its strict family-planning polices that limit most urban couples to having only one child, a senior official said, though the government is still deliberating the issue and is a long way away from a final decision.
China's family-planning policies were launched in 1973, in response to a wave of births that threatened to send population growth out of control. China's birth rate had soared during the Cultural Revolution, reaching as high as 5.8 children per couple, creating worries of strains on the country's limited water, food and energy resources.
Today, China's birth rate has declined to 1.8, below the 2.1 needed to keep the population from declining. Many scholars say that a lower birth rate will create social difficulties in the future, as there are fewer young working adults to pay taxes and look after the elderly. Officials have also come under criticism for the heavy-handed coercion often used to enforce family-planning rules. That has led to increasing calls for a shift away from the current model.
'We want incrementally to have this change,' Reuters quoted Vice Minister of the National Population and Family Planning Commission Zhao Baige as saying in Beijing. 'I cannot answer at what time or how but this has become a big issue among decision makers.' Officials intend to study the issue and avoid a reversal that might end up spiking births, she said.
Although China's family-planning policies are often referred to as simply the one-child policy, there is actually a good deal of variation. The rules permit some couples in rural areas, which make up the majority of the population, to have two children, with ethnic minorities and some poorer areas getting even larger dispensations. Also, an urban couple who are themselves both only children may have more than one child.
Any future policy shift is unlikely to mean a complete abandonment of controls. A year ago, the family-planning commission published a three-year review of population policies that concluded that China couldn't support a population of much more than the current 1.3 billion people. Some control of birth rates was therefore necessary, the review concluded, though it also argued there was scope to make controls less coercive and based more on positive incentives.
China's population is still growing. In December, state media reported that the population would hit 1.5 billion by 2033 and that birth rates would soar in the next five years.
Jason Leow
