What is the population of China now?

More than 1.4 billion people

The truth about China's population problem

"If you want to understand what depression is, you should visit the railway stations in Beijing or Guangzhou before and after the Spring Festival. Embarrassed faces surged in the crowd. Only then do you know where the wounds of a nation are. " Xiao M, a research student who has just been assigned to the National Family Planning Commission, described this to several writers. The National Family Planning Commission, where he works, has saved China 5 million births in 2 years, which has delayed the arrival of disaster in Chinese mainland. But they have to endure a lot of international condemnation (against abortion, fines and the one-child policy), domestic incomprehension and even violence against grassroots workers. And this unit has been neglected ... We don't know whether the population disaster will come. We only know that the biggest problem in Chinese mainland in the next century (more serious than environment, corruption, economy and education) is population.

The old peasants in mainland China are extremely poor but don't forget to have children

"Guess how many children there are in our nanny's house, and you can't guess, she has nine brothers and sisters." Xiang Xiaomi, a female writer, sighed to me: "It's terrible! This is generally the case in any county in Shaanxi, where there are seven or eight children. There was no work, no seeds, all the trees were cut bare, and the land gradually became a desert. These people wanted to eat, so they all ran to the city. Make the city dirty and messy, and the crime rate has soared. That's why I want to send my daughter to the United States ... "

In the past year or two, the reporter found that this phenomenon of having five or six or seven or eight children in one family is quite common in many parts of the mainland. The national policy of family planning is very flexible to be implemented everywhere, and in some places it has even become a tool for cadres to collect money. Don't you want to live? Bring the money.

In fact, the one-child policy has become a signboard of an isolated city in the sea of Wang Yang.

A few years ago, when the reporter went to Daning, a poverty-stricken county in Shanxi Province to cover the corruption case of poverty relief funds, he visited the home of a mountaineer whose family was surrounded by walls. This owner, a low-rise old farmer in his 4 s and 5 s, was repeatedly unfortunate. Not only was the cadre used his name to receive poverty relief funds, but he was not given a penny. The youngest boy was bitten by a snake in the grass and his life was dying. When we walked into his cave in the mountain, he began to cry. We gave him a little help as much as we could, and he plopped down on his knees to show his gratitude. When we learned how many children he had, several of us were surprised, eight.

This is completely beyond our expectation. After years of propaganda on the excellent situation of family planning, we feel that at most two children can be born in rural areas. Even those who blindly resist the law and are stripped of their houses can only have three or four children. And what are eight numbers? That's more than before 1949. It may also be that compared with before 1949, these families have not improved much in housing, enough food but not much better quality, but the popularity of antibiotics and other drugs has indeed made the phenomenon of stillbirth much less. Before 19 49, a peasant family could have many children, but only half of them survived. Therefore, despite the constraints of family planning, the rural population has soared.

When the reporter visited Jingbian, Shaanxi Province, he found that although the farmers there were suffering from various taxes, and the land was becoming increasingly dry and desertification, their lives were very difficult, and they also gave birth to many children. It is common for a family to have four or five children, even the smallest number.

When a female reporter interviewed Jin 'geda Village, a poor mountain village in Daning County, Shanxi Province, she found that farmers there had an average of six children. A little girl of five or six years old told her that she had four brothers and one sister. Someone pointed to another girl in red and said, "The child's father and three brothers each have six children." The female reporter learned that there are almost no triplets in Jin 'geda Village, most of them are five or six, and the largest family has seven, and most of them have two or three boys.

In a place where it is difficult to even draft, so many children have to be born, and they all ask for it from the earth together, so the earth is even poorer and sicker.

poverty, ignorance, oppression and having children are closely related.

do rural cadres enjoy reproductive privileges?

In poverty-stricken areas, it is found that cadres generally violate family planning, which is much beyond my expectation, because in my impression, they are all owners who rob people's houses because others have more children.

Sun Xinde, the former brigade director of Jin 'geda Village in Daning County, just turned 4 this year, but he has six children. He told reporters that the current new director is still seven miles away ...

It is this village that was even rated as an advanced family planning village, which is incredible! At the same time, it is a well-off village, and the actual per capita annual income in 1999 did not even reach 5 yuan.

regarding the current situation of family planning in Jin' geda village, Zhang Yonghua, secretary of the Party Committee of Yucun Township, told reporters that the actual population of Jin' geda village is 1.96, while the number of reported people is 11, with more than 14 registered households, and the rest are refugees from Henan and Shandong. They came here because family planning there was so tight. "The floating population does not move into the household registration. Our family planning work here is carried out according to the local population and household registration. The foreign population is not easy to manage, and it can't be managed. " (There are six or seven children in each family under their own jurisdiction, which is more than that of the foreign population. On the contrary, it is difficult to manage the foreign population.) None of the county cadres contacted by the reporter is a child, while most of the township cadres are more than three children.

The reporter met Wang Ping, a Beijing educated youth who is still in Daning, Shanxi, and married a local farmer. She has only two children, which is quite conspicuous in local families with many children. She told reporters that the township cadres in Taide Township are generally four children.

cadres are like this, so you can imagine the people who have always regarded children as their lives. Various phenomena show that family planning is close to collapse in many poor areas of China.

how many people are there in China now?

Just as all statistics are questionable, so are the population figures. Many mainstream people in China have concluded that the current population of China is neither 1.2 billion nor 1.3 billion, which should have exceeded 1.4 billion and reached 1.5 billion. This is still a conservative estimate.

Is China's population statistics accurate? There has been a great debate in recent years.

"It is safe to say that it is not accurate!" A friend who has done statistical work in China for many years asserted: "Although demographic statistics are a matter of the whole society, the actual lead and specific operators are the statistical offices around the country. The distortion of statistical data has long been known. I have worked in the Bureau of Statistics for six years. I participated in the first national survey of the tertiary industry in 1993, the first national agricultural survey in 1994 and the third national industrial survey in 1995, and I was the main reviewer. I reported all kinds of census summary data. My colleagues in the Bureau of Statistics and I feel the same way: sometimes the data reported in the newspaper simply feel guilty, and they cheat the country, but leaders at all levels play with statistical data for political achievements. What can we do? For example, the number of livestock in the agricultural statistical reports of our county over the years is 32,, but according to the census data reported by townships (there is already water), there are only 25, in the county. Finally, at the instigation of leaders at all levels, the census data reported by our county is nearly 31,. Not to mention the distortion of the industrial census. "

This friend said that although he has never participated in the census, the estimation error will be very large, much smaller than the actual data, because the data is too large, which means that the family planning work in your area has not been done well. If it is too different from the statistical annual reports of previous years, the leaders will definitely "veto it with one vote". He was glad that he had been transferred from the Bureau of Statistics and didn't have to "commit crimes". You don't know, the "extraordinary and leap-forward development" proposed by various places depends on statistics, and the achievements in poverty alleviation are all based on statistical data. "So I never take the statistical bulletin of the National Bureau of Statistics seriously, because the main data they publish are based on the calculations reported by our local newspapers." It is difficult for a country like China to make any statistics accurate, especially demographic statistics. At present, the fifth national census is drawing to a close. Sichuan "Shu Bao" reported that since the end of November, their reporters have conducted spot checks on 26 exclusive small courtyards in three groups around the Second Ring Road in Chengdu in recent days, and found that 86 of the 248 people in 26 exclusive small courtyards escaped the census, and all of them are migrants.

The three groups randomly selected by the reporter are group 2 of Donggui Village in Baohe Township, chenghua district, group 1 of Tiaodenghe River in Shengdeng Township and group 4 of Baozhao Village in jinniu district. Of the 148 foreign workers in these places, 86 escaped the census, accounting for more than half of the foreign population. Why do they avoid the census?

It turns out that none of them have applied for a temporary residence permit. One is afraid that after registration, the police station will check the temporary residence according to this clue. Second, sometimes the public security personnel cooperate with the investigators in the night census, and these temporary residents are afraid of being found out, so they avoid the census takers.

Generally, these outsiders are covered by landlords to avoid the census. In the face of census takers, the landlord only registers those who have been added or not. Of course, some foreigners who don't have temporary residence permits will wander around or go out for a walk once they know the census time in their area.

Since November, many media have reported that "ten million people were missed" in Hunan census. To this end, the People's Daily issued a document saying that the reason why there are all kinds of misinformation is that the "bottom-up" data is low is because "there are 6 million migrant workers in Hunan, which is not within the scope of registration in Hunan according to the provisions of the Census Measures. Second, a few grassroots cadres don't understand the census policy thoroughly and are unwilling to report it according to the facts. In addition, there is indeed a phenomenon of human interference in the census in some places. For example, during the census, the floating population was charged security fees and temporary residence fees, which affected the preliminary work to a certain extent ... "

Hunan is not a populous province, but there are still 1 million figures arguing. Other provinces can imagine.

It seems that the whole nation is worried about the population figures. A college student said this. The census itself is a good thing, but I'm worried that the final number will be too amazing.

traditional culture and "yellow peril"

There is a saying that social relations and family culture in China have caused the current population situation. The survival competition between people in rural areas of China is fierce, where there are no permanent friends and relatives, but permanent enemies. For a ridge, a few feet of homestead, a few seedlings ... distant relatives and neighbors can fight. And in that backwater, all kinds of relationships are permanent and difficult to change, and it is a lifelong thing to make enemies.

without the checks and balances of just laws and the venting and soothing of religious forces, it is easy to form a situation that strength is justice. Therefore, the prosperous family "does not suffer." Relatives form one side of the battle, but "relatives" are far and near. Distant relatives may become enemies because they are not close enough. Who is the closest relative, son? But with sons, it's not good to have a small number. It's certain that fewer sons will be bullied by more sons. Nothing is as Japanese as this scene, and there is a conflict with the villagers. Hula, seven or eight brothers are drilled from the house, all of which are men. Who is not afraid to see the south neighbors and the north houses?

To put it bluntly, the most difficult clan in rural China is the son power. The one with the most sons can be the clan leader when he is old.

to put it more broadly, once a Millennium power changed dynasties and a small country was divided, why should a country stand on its feet? It is to have a large number of soldiers and a wide range of troops, so it is necessary to have a large number of people. Why did Mao Zedong criticize Ma Yinchu at that time? It wasn't because he was involved with Malthus, so he violated the instruction of the revolutionary mentor. Mao Zedong was always flexible and didn't particularly care that some practical views were in conflict with sages. The underlying reason is that Ma Yinchu has destroyed the grand vision in his mind, which is similar to the ancient collar sleeve, that is, rich in material wealth and people, densely populated, so the army is inexhaustible children. This is the basis for the mainland revolutionaries who lack guns and medicines to fight against imperialism and various forces that surround them, that is, to "fight the war of annihilation with absolute superiority."

The times have changed. Nowadays, economic take-off and military victory have long depended on manpower, but overpopulation has become the biggest force to stagnate a country.

according to the statistics of relevant mainland authorities, in the 198s, the rural surplus labor force in mainland China was close to 15 million, accounting for about 2% of the rural population at that time. In the 199s, due to the occupation of cultivated land and desertification, the rural surplus labor force was close to 3 million, which made the agricultural productivity close to zero or even negative, and aggravated the poverty situation in rural areas.

After the early 199s, these surplus laborers went out to seek employment among cities in China, and some of them wandered around, which became the basis of urban chaos, crime and underworld. This is the most frightening hidden danger of whether China can keep the reform achievements in the future.

the current situation of rural population is likely to make the national grand plan of limiting the population to the highest point of 1.5 billion by 22 fail. In addition to the above points, Beijing scholars are particularly worried that the uncontrolled growth of rural population will reduce the average quality of China population. Their worry is that those illiterate people in rural areas can live indefinitely, while urban intellectuals, professors, scholars and experts are strictly limited to have only one child. In the long run, a small number of high-quality people who add luster to the Chinese nation will be drowned in the low-quality sea of Wang Yang. (The 21st issue of Hong Kong Phoenix Weekly. )