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How do you convince a population to have more babies after generations of a policy that limited families to just one? A decade after ending China's longtime, one-child policy, authorities are pushing a whole range of ideas and policies to try and encourage more births, ranging from cash subsidies to taxing condoms. The efforts haven't paid off yet. At least, that is what population figures released Monday show for what is now the world's second-most populous nation. China's population of 1.4 billion continued to shrink, marking the fourth straight year of decrease, new government statistics show. The total population in 2025 stood at 1.404 billion, which was 3 million less than the previous year. The statistics illustrate the stark demographic pressures the country faces. The number of new babies born was just 7.92 million in 2025, a decline of 1.62 million, or 17%. The latest birth numbers show the slight tick upwards in 2024 was not a lasting trend. Births declined for seven year
The US population is projected to grow by 15 million in 30 years, a smaller estimate than in previous years, due to President Donald Trump's hard-line immigration policies and an aging population, the Congressional Budget Office has said. The nonpartisan budget office projected that US population will be 364 million in 30 years, 2.2 per cent smaller than it had predicted at this time a year ago. In September, the office issued a revised demographics report that showed Trump's plans for mass deportations and other strict immigration measures would result in roughly 320,000 people removed from the United States over the next 10 years. The country's total population is projected to stop growing in 2056 and remain roughly the same size as in the previous year, the CBO said. But without immigration, the population would begin to shrink in 2030. Even if the limits on immigration and increased deportations end with the Trump administration in three years, it's still a demographic shock, .
India's population is expected to stabilise by 2080 at 1.8 or 1.9 billion due to dipping total fertility rate, which is currently below the replacement level at 1.9, an official said. India is undergoing a rapid demographic transition, with the birth rate dropping sharply over the past two decades, he said. "In 2000, our TFR was 3.5 and today it stands at 1.9. This is a drastic decline," Indian Association for the Study of Population (IASP) general secretary Anil Chandran told PTI. He said India's population is expected to peak at 1.8 or 1.9 billion by 2080, when growth is expected to stabilise. "All estimates show that India's maximum population will remain below two billion," Chandran added. He attributed the fall in fertility primarily to increasing development and education levels. Increased female literacy, he said, has directly shaped decisions around marriage and childbearing, leading to smaller families. Greater use of contraceptives and wider access to birth control have
For a quarter century, President Vladimir Putin has faced the spectre of Russia's shrinking and aging population. In 1999, a year before he came to power, the number of babies born in Russia plunged to its lowest recorded level. In 2005, Putin said the demographic woes needed to be resolved by maintaining "social and economic stability. In 2019, he said the problem still haunted the country. As recently as Thursday, he told a Kremlin demographic conference that increasing births was crucial for Russia. Putin has launched initiatives to encourage people to have more children -- from free school meals for large families to awarding Soviet-style hero-mother medals to women with 10 or more children. Many of our grandmothers and great-grandmothers had seven, eight, and even more children, Putin said in 2023. Let's preserve and revive these wonderful traditions. Having many children and a large family must become the norm. At first, births in Russia grew with its economic prosperity, f
Outside a train station near Tokyo, hundreds of people cheer as Sohei Kamiya, head of the surging nationalist party Sanseito, criticises Japan's rapidly growing foreign population. As opponents, separated by uniformed police and bodyguards, accuse him of racism, Kamiya shouts back, saying he is only talking common sense. Sanseito, while still a minor party, made big gains in July's parliamentary election, and Kamiya's Japanese First platform of anti-globalism, anti-immigration and anti-liberalism is gaining broader traction ahead of a ruling party vote Saturday that will choose the likely next prime minister. Anti-immigrant policies, which allow populists to vent their dissatisfaction on easy targets, are appealing to more Japanese as they struggle with dwindling salaries, rising prices and bleak future outlooks. Many Japanese are frustrated by these problems, though we are too reserved to speak out. Mr. Kamiya is spelling them all out for us, said Kenzo Hagiya, a retiree in the ..
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has said that the state government will soon unveil a new policy framework to address declining fertility rates and demographic imbalance. Speaking at the Amaravati Summit on World Population Day on Friday, Naidu emphasised that population should be treated as the state's greatest economic strength, not a burden. "Population is the nation's strongest economic asset. A robust policy on population growth will be introduced soon," said Naidu, addressing the summit. He observed that rising expenses are deterring young couples from having children, while Parliament seats may increase in the future, southern states could see reduced representation. The CM recalled his earlier efforts promoting family planning and noted that today's demographic trends call for a shift in focus from control to management of population growth. "Before 2004, as CM, I incentivised family planning. We even brought a law disqualifying those with more than two .
A special dedicated web portal will be launched for self-enumeration during the upcoming Census, which will be available for both phases of the national enumeration exercise, officials said Monday. In the country's first digital census, enumerators will collect the data of citizens using mobile applications on their Android and Apple phones, they said. It will also be the first time in the country that citizens will get a chance to self-enumerate through a dedicated web portal which will be available for both the phases of Census - Houselisting and Housing Census (HLO) and Population Enumeration. "Digital Census initiative is a transformational step towards modernising the Census process. For the first time, technology will be used to collect data and send it electronically to the central server. This will result in early availability of Census data," an official said. Very stringent data security measures would be kept in place to ensure data security at the time of collection, ..
The Centre has asked states and Union Territories to make any proposed changes in the boundaries of administrative units before December 31, when they will be considered final for the census exercise. In a letter to all states and Union Territories, Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India Mritunjay Kumar Narayan has said that for the Census, all villages and towns are divided into uniform enumeration blocks and for each block, an enumerator is assigned to avoid any miss or repetition during the population count. According to norms, the Census can be conducted only three months after the freezing of boundary limits of administrative units such as districts, sub-districts, tehsils, talukas and police stations. Narayan said from April 1, 2026, the Houselisting Operation, the appointment of supervisors and enumerators and the work division among them will be done, and on February 1, 2027, the Census of the population will begin. It is important that once enumeration blocks
