A population decrease in rural areas during the period of high economic growth
is a normal and natural phenomenon. As long as the peasants remaining in the
rural areas are successful in raising productivity and upgrading the existing rural
communities into new developed ones, the population decrease does not have
negative consequences. What has been the case in this regard in China?
The fifth national census of 2000 carries two kinds of population data, namely
family registration and current residence. If the population measured by an area’s
family registration is larger than that measured by current residence, it means
that that area is losing population. In the opposite case, the area is gaining popu-
lation. Calculation shows that 12 out of 31, or 38.7 percent of provincial-level
administrative regions lost population, as did 192 among 350 (45.1 percent)
prefectural-level administrative regions and 869 out of 1,186 (73.3 percent) of
county-level regions. For county-level regions, the calculation was limited to just
14 provinces rather than the 31 provincial-level regions. Rural areas are mainly
in county-level regions. Overall, the data show that in and around 2000, 70 to 80
percent of rural areas were losing population.
The loss of rural population is caused mainly by young workers flowing out
from rural areas. It is estimated that as of 2004, around 140 million peasants have
left rural areas. They are abandoning agriculture, especially culti-
vation of main traditional crops such as grains, soybean, and cotton.
We see that during a period of about 20 years, sown area under
miscellaneous cereals and spring wheat shrank by three-
fourths, and that under early ripening indica rice by half. Meanwhile, production
of soybean and cotton has increased. However, import of these two commodities
increased faster leading to a decrease in the self-sufficiency ratio.
This means that agricultural product processing industries in rural
areas are shrinking, with accompanying job losses. Unless job growth in alterna-
tive new rural industries offset these losses, the process leads to a net loss of job
opportunities in rural areas. This seems to be what is happening in the rural areas
of inland provinces.
There are some worrisome developments in the tertiary sector of rural areas
too. As a result of the one child policy and population exodus, many primary
schools and junior high schools in rural areas have been closed down or amalga-
mated with those in county capitals or cities. The number of schools providing pri-
mary education in rural areas of Zhejiang province decreased by about 95 percent
between 1990 and 2000, and the number of teachers decreased by about 80 per-
cent. Similar tendencies can be observed in Zhejiang rural areas with respect to
junior high school education. The opposite can be seen in the urban areas, where
the numbers of both students and teachers have increased. The same phenom-
ena can be observed in Chengdu of Sichuan province, whose economic level is
far lower than of Zhejiang province. As a whole therefore rural areas in China are
facing a decline.
