Population: Learn from China’s mistakes

The title of the “world’s most populous country” that China hands over to India is not a coveted honour. China carried that dubious distinction for decades, and it is possible that India will continue to hold the crown for ever, if the present geographies and national boundaries hold for the world. Beijing has reported that the country’s population shrank in 2022 for the first time in more than 60 years. The shrinkage was caused by the now-abandoned ‘one child’ policy. It did diminish the growth rate of the population but at great social and economic costs and consequences, as China has been finding out lately. There is a shortage of productive labour force and a steep rise in the number of aged and ageing people in the country. The Chinese government now wants families to produce two, even three, children. It will take a long time for the liberalised norms to take effect, whereas the impact of the demographic decline is already being felt.

India will soon touch the 1.4 billion mark and the country will have the responsibility to feed, clothe, house, educate and ensure the health of people on a scale not seen in history. The workforce seeking employment will keep increasing for the foreseeable future, and the economy will have to grow and provide jobs for them. It is estimated that the working-age population stood at 900 million in 2021, as exact figures are not available it in the absence of census data.

It is expected to touch more than one billion by the end of the decade. India has not been able to provide enough jobs even when economic growth was high. It will be a bigger challenge now. According to the World Bank, the active workforce and people looking for work stood at 46 per cent in India in 2021, which was the lowest in Asia. Women’s participation in the workforce was an abysmally low 19 per cent. Unless the country can cater to the food, health, education and other needs of the people, the much-talked-about demographic dividend will turn into a liability. There is a view that India may has already missed the bus.

The policy to meet the population challenge is not to try to control the population, as advocated by some sections. That is a politically motivated proposal directed at Muslims, feeding on the myth that the Muslim population is growing faster than the Hindu population and will overtake it at some point. The Muslim family-size is also shrinking in the country. The challenge is to improve maternal and child health to stabilise population growth, provide education and employment to all, especially the poorer sections. The country must turn this challenge into an opportunity.