Government researchers say we're near the end
China's population will peak at 1.44 billion in 2029 and then start a long period of 'unstoppable' decline the following year according to new research from the government.
In the latest edition of the "Green Book of Population and Labor" from the China Academy of Social Sciences the main future challenge will be to craft policies to cope with a declining labor force and rapidly ageing population.
The number of working-age people has already peaked.
"From a theoretical point of view, the long-term population decline, especially when it is accompanied by a continuously ageing population, is bound to cause very unfavourable social and economic consequences," the report said.
By the middle of the century the workforce could lose as many as 200 million workers and population could fall to 1.17 billion by 2065.
China relaxed its 'one-child policy' in 2016 but the birth rate fell anyway and is expected to have continued falling in 2018.
As I've said before, the great future problem isn't overpopulation, it's underpopulation.
