Faced with declining birth rate and shrinking labour force, China may turn to forced pregnancies and outright force couples to have children, says Beijing Bulletin quoting various reports.

The Xi Jinping regime has put in place a three-child norm and is forcing early marriages in its bid to push up birth rate.   But the would-be parents are not impressed. In fact, they are putting up stiff opposition asserting ‘We just cannot guarantee enough financial security to our children when our own lives are under pressure’ in these pandemic days.

Forced quarantines, unending stay at homes, and food shortages coupled with lack of income, rising prices and health problems have made eligible couples unresponsive to the government campaign for a boost to birth rate, the report said. The pain and torture that accompanied the one-child policy is still fresh in people’s memory but millions of forced abortions carried out at that time made the government lose the trust of the people.  

Now, a worried government is trying to generate trust with a two-way communication about the need for more children to tackle the population crisis, The Hong Kong Post stated, citing sources.

Between 2013 and 2019, the number of Chinese marriages nose-dived by 41 per cent and the birth rate dropped to 7.5 births per 1,000 people. Only 7.6 million couples registered for marriage last year, according to China National Bureau of Statistics.

Nine provinces and regions have registered negative population growth, the report added. This will dramatically shrink the labour force of the country.

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