CHINESE MORE FREE TO DECIDE BIRTH TIMING AND SPACING BUT

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 BEIJING 002795 STATE FOR PRM/POP STATE ALSO FOR DRL/PHD, IO/HS, DRL, EAP/PD, AND EAP/CM PASS TO USAID SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: SOCI KPAO KPOP PHUM TBIO UNFPA CH SUBJECT: CHINESE MORE FREE TO DECIDE BIRTH TIMING AND SPACING BUT BIRTH LIMITATION POLICY REMAINS IN EFFECT REF: A) BEIJING 2187 B) STATE 77549 C) SHANGHAI 351 ¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY: China has relaxed some family planning controls and is turning towards more incentive-based mechanisms for the enforcement of family planning policies and targets. Although a restrictive policy, especially for urban areas, still exists, the most significant progress is increasing freedom for couples on when to have children. While the baseline of China's strict birth limitation policy remains that married couples may only have one child, the policy also provides for several categories of households, regions, and groups (particularly ethnic minorities) totaling up to 65 percent of couples who are exempted and therefore eligible to have more children. END SUMMARY. SHANGHAI HAS NOT ALTERED ONE-CHILD POLICY -------------- -------------- ¶2. (SBU) Widespread press speculation of a major shift in China's family planning policy broke out in July 2009, when domestic and international media reported that Shanghai was now encouraging couples to have two children (REF C). Later stories walked back the claim that Shanghai had changed its policy, clarifying that encouragement to have a second child was only "for eligible couples," namely prospective parents who themselves have no siblings. Local family planning officials acknowledged that the change of emphasis was in response to the social impact of the one-child policy, and were quoted as saying, "we advocate eligible couples having two children because this can help reduce the proportion of the aging within the population and alleviate a workforce shortage in the future." An official statement on Shanghai's Population and Family Planning Commission website emphasized that this practice was intended only to inform people of existing exceptions to the one child rule and did not in fact signal a change to that policy. ¶3. (SBU) In a July 31 meeting with ESTHOffs, Deputy Director General RU Xiaomei of the National Population and Family Planning Commission's (NPFPC) International Cooperation Department dismissed the significance of the attention on Shanghai and called the informational flyers delivered to eligible families "routine"(REF A). Questioned further about the possibility of China addressing the pressures caused by the aging population or imbalanced sex ratio at birth through easing its one child policy, Ru elaborated on the strategic, programmatic, and systemic changes that NPFPC is currently making, noting that policy changes would be "neither easy nor fast." BIRTH LIMITATION CONCEPT REAFFIRMED -------------- -------------- ¶4. (SBU) The consistent message from China's central leadership in recent years indicates that the family planning policy is unlikely to change in the near future. In December of 2006, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the State Council jointly put out a Decision on "Fully Enhancing Population and Family Planning Programs and Comprehensively Addressing Population Issues" ("the Decision"). This is only the third formal policy statement on family planning for the PRC, with the first issued in 1991 and the second in 2000. A core part of "the Decision" calls for stabilizing China's low fertility level "with all efforts" and for China "to never waver over the implementation of the fundamental national policy of family planning and stabilization of the existing fertility policy." This decision currently defines the long term orientation of China's family planning policies. ¶5. (SBU) The Central Government has issued repeated affirmations of "the Decision" at the highest levels. In 2008 and again in 2009, family planning policy was on the agendas of the National People's Congress (NPC) and Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC),during which media and netizens renewed the debate (carefully moderated and controlled by Party censors) over China's one-child policy. In his work reports to the NPC in 2008 and 2009, Premier Wen Jiabao emphasized the stability of the country's family planning policy. On both occasions, Premier Wen highlighted the continuation of the current policy of family planning, of which maintaining China's low birthrate remains the key component. ¶6. (SBU) While sources outside of the government acknowledge that China's fundamental family planning policy of birth limitation may not change in the long term, they noted some positive adjustments and shifts to parts of that policy and its implementation. Mariam Khan, Deputy Representative of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in China, told ESTHOffs in a July 30 meeting that she has BEIJING 00002795 002 OF 004 observed a growing level of public discourse on family planning policy. She noted that a key area of UNFPA's reproductive health and family planning work in China is improving the level of informed choice for individuals, in both contraception methods and the timing of births. ¶7. (SBU) Peking University (PKU) demographers Professor CHEN Gong, Deputy Director of PKU's Institute of Population Research, and Professor Mu Guangzong, told ESTHOffs in a July 24 meeting that researchers and scholars who focus on the social and economic pressures caused by China's aging population and by China's gender imbalance tend to advocate adjustment or elimination of China's birth limitation policies. They acknowledged, however, that there are varying points of view, including a minority that has advocated for stricter enforcement of China's birth limitation policies. During the most recent NPC session in March 2009, a Chinese Academy of Social Sciences researcher and NPC deputy CHENG Enfu introduced a proposal for a tightening in family planning rules, arguing that China's social and economic development successes have stemmed from its strict implementation of family planning. Despite 'the Decision' and extremist views like Cheng's, Chen and Mu echoed Khan's assessment that public discourse on family planning is widening and that China has been making small adjustments in easing the controls and enforcement of its family planning policies. SCOPE OF ONE-CHILD RESTRICTIONS -------------- -------------- ¶8. (SBU) While China's birth limitation policies are often seen as monolithic, in practice, each province and municipality sets its own regulations for implementation and enforcement of the national family planning policies, as standardized in the 2002 National Population and Family Planning Law. Beyond the baseline of couples being allowed only one child, all localities include several categories of both urban and rural couples who are eligible to have a second (and in some cases a third) child, contributing to China's total fertility rate of around 1.8 since the late 1990s. In Beijing, for example, there are nine categories of people who may be eligible to have a second child, plus requests can be made in "other special circumstances." Shanghai has 12 categories for eligibility to have a second child. In Fujian, there are six categories of regular married couples who are eligible to have a second child, plus two categories for remarried couples. ¶9. (SBU) Taking these exceptions into account, countrywide, only about 35 percent of families are legally limited to having only one child. Over 50 percent of families are eligible to have a second child because they meet one of a variety of criteria. The most common criterion is in rural areas where the first child is a girl, with another major category if both persons in a marriage are only children themselves. Some other exceptions are if a first child is disabled or dies, if the father is a disabled veteran, or in cases of remarriage. Nearly 10 percent of families may have two children outright, most commonly in ethnic minority provinces of Hainan, Yunnan, Qinghai, Ningxia, and Xinjiang, but also in other impoverished or isolated low population areas. Ethnic minority areas in general have more relaxed policies, allowing a third child in some cases. ¶10. (SBU) According to official Chinese publications available online, ethnic Tibetans and other minorities residing in rural areas of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) (the majority of the TAR population) are not subject to limits on the number of children per family, but are "encouraged" to have no more than three children (http://tinyurl.com/y9q7h22). Several other population categories in the TAR are, on the other hand, subject to restrictions. Specifically, civil servants of Han ethnicity may only have one child per married couple, while ethnic Tibetan civil servants and urban residents are restricted to two children per couple. Official sources are inconsistent in their statistics regarding the number of TAR residents who actually fall into one of these three categories, ranging from 8 to 20 percent. (NOTE: Tibetan populations outside of the TAR are subject to the rules governing their respective localities. END NOTE) ¶11. (SBU) COMMENT: Post's knowledge about how these policies are actually implemented in the TAR is limited due to restricted access, and we note that debate continues among scholars as to the existence and extent of coercive birth control policies in Tibetan areas. Moreover, population statistics for the TAR--such as the estimates cited in paragraph 10 regarding the proportion of the TAR population subject to birth limits--are highly politicized, and the significant impact of Han migration on the TAR's demographic landscape has been consistently downplayed in official statistics. END COMMENT. BEIJING 00002795 003 OF 004 ONE CHILD ONLY, EVEN WHEN ELIGIBLE FOR MORE -------------- ¶12. (SBU) According to PKU Professor Mu, growing awareness of the economic costs of having larger families, in addition to new government programs offering incentives for having fewer children, is increasing the number of both urban and rural families who choose to have only one child even when they are eligible to have more. PKU's Chen and Mu stated that the fear of a sudden rebound in China's population growth if birth limitations are loosened is unfounded and speculated that an attempt to reverse the extremely low birth rates in some areas would be difficult. They noted that estimates of the birth rate even among those families eligible for a second child range from 1.6 to 1.7. ¶13. (SBU) A local newspaper in Shandong reported in March 2009 that 250,000 couples in rural areas of Shandong whose first child was a girl have already voluntarily given up the opportunity to have a second child. According to statistics from the Information Center of the Shandong Provincial Population and Family Planning Commission, in Weihai City alone, 65 percent of couples eligible to have a second child have chosen not to do so. Similarly, results reported from a 2006 Beijing City Population Research Institute survey of three Beijing districts showed that many eligible couples were not intending to have a second child. The survey sampled 1,315 couples between the ages of 20 and 34 in which both partners were only children and thus were eligible to have two children. 36 percent of respondents answered that they were considering having two children while 64 percent answered that they did not think they would elect to have two children. In the context of discussing the demand for illegal ultrasound for fetal sex identification, Mu gave an example of a couple he encountered in rural Yunnan Province eligible to have up to three children, but who had taken measures to ensure that their first child was a boy, because they wanted to avoid the economic burden of having more children. ¶14. (SBU) PKU's Mu further pointed out a demographic trend that could eventually spell the end to the one-child policy in practical fact if not in law. Mu described how men and women who are only children, born in the 1980s when China first began to enforce its birth limitation policy and the strict one-child rule in urban areas, are a rapidly growing proportion of the urban population now of marriageable and childbearing age. According to Mu, since every provincial regulation except Henan Province already includes the eligibility of a married couple comprised of two only children to have a second child, couples restricted to having only one child may soon be the exception rather than the rule. GREATER INDIVIDUAL CHOICE IN TIMING AND SPACING OF BIRTHS -------------- -------------- -------------- ¶15. (SBU) According to UNFPA's Khan, the greatest positive change within China's family planning policies has been the increased freedom that couples now have to choose the timing and spacing of births. Provinces have been gradually phasing out the requisite of obtaining a birth permit for a first child, which had been the primary mechanism for managing annual birth quotas and required couples to apply for permission to get pregnant. According to PKU demographers Chen and Mu, "birth service certificates" have replaced the "birth permits," a notable distinction being that the timing of the first child is no longer centrally managed, and a couple can register for the Birth Service Certificate after pregnancy. Jiangxi Province was the latest to revise its population and family planning regulations by abolishing birth permits in April 2009. According to NPFPC, all provinces have now eliminated the birth approval process for a first child. Couples are still required to demonstrate eligibility and apply for permission to have a second or third child. ¶16. (SBU) Another liberalization of family planning restrictions, which experts all highlighted, is the gradual elimination of birth spacing requirements. In the past, eligible parents were required to wait either four years or until the mother had reached a minimum age before having a second child. In 2003, Hainan Province was the first to eliminate birth spacing requirements. By 2007, Shanghai, Gansu, Jilin, Hunan, and Zhejiang had followed suit. Guangdong, Hubei, Shanxi, and Inner Mongolia removed birth spacing from their local family planning regulations in 2008, and in the first half of 2009, Shaanxi, Hubei, and Jiangxi also did so, bringing the total to 13 provinces. UNFPA's Mariam Khan also noted progress on the elimination of birth spacing in UNFPA's project counties (NOTE: UNFPA projects are being conducted in one county in each of China's 30 provinces. END NOTE). Khan reported to ESTHOffs that, as of July 2009, 20 of 30 UNFPA project counties had removed their birth BEIJING 00002795 004 OF 004 spacing requirements. COMMENT -------------- ¶17. (SBU) COMMENT: Despite the government's long term commitment to maintaining its family planning policy and low fertility rate, China's birth limitation policy is no longer a strict 'one-child policy.' Currently only 35 percent of families are legally limited to having only one child, and, at least in some regions, many couples eligible to have more than one child are choosing not to have more children. China has also loosened controls over birth timing and birth spacing, giving couples greater freedom to decide when they will have children. Although cases of abuse and coercive enforcement are still often reported at the local level, nationwide trends seem to indicate that the Central Government, at least on paper, would like to introduce greater choice and flexibility in implementation of its family planning policy, while steadfastly adhering to China's "vision" of "stabilizing China's low fertility level." END COMMENT. HUNTSMAN