Beijing Scotching rumours that China will relax its coercive family planning programme, a senior official has said the mandatory one-child policy will not be changed for now as it has hepled prevent 400 million births.
China will unswervingly implement the family planning policy, Minister in charge of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, Zhang Weiqing said.
"To maintain the current low birth rate, the family planning policy must not change," he said in an interview at the government's website, adding the mandatory 'one child per couple' policy has prevented 400 million births in 30 years, helping the most populous nation to achieve faster economic growth.
"The goal of ensuring Chinese people a relatively comfortable life would not be achieved if we had 400 million more people," he said.
At present, there are 1.8 children for a Chinese couple on average, while the number of children for each couple came to six in early 1970s.
China had baby booms in the early 1950s, 1960s and the late 1980s. The fourth is expected between 2006 and 2010. But Zhang said the imminent baby boom is not expected to be large and the country hopes to maintain a relatively low birth rate.
China has nearly 100 million people who were raised in single-child families and many of them have approached their child bearing age. The children of rural couples, who have been allowed to have more than one child if their first is a girl since the mid-1980s, will soon starting having babies of their own.
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