According to the “State of World Population Report 2023” released by the United Nations Population Fund on April 19, India will replace China as the world’s most populous country by the middle of this year. This is a result of population growth, but some Western media reports have changed this. “The world’s ‘centre of gravity’ has shifted”, “Major changes in the global order”, “Demographic losses have made it more difficult for China to achieve its goal of rejuvenation”… For the time being, Western media has come out with a series of sensational reports. The meaning behind which is: China’s development is going to be in big trouble.
In fact, it is nothing new for Western media to paint China’s population as a problem. In recent years, from the population and fertility policy to the increase in the elderly population and the decrease in the number of births, they constantly want to say that the “demographic dividend” in China has disappeared and that China will collapse and the world economy will decline. Will also come Although he maligned China in every way, China continued to grow, and China created a miracle of stable economic growth with a large population. Western countries such as the United States deliberately ignore that the characteristics of China’s development model and political system are the reasons for China’s great development achievements. They used the theme of “the transformation of the most populous country” to talk of a slowdown in China’s economic development and tried their best to stifle China’s growth momentum.
Decline in the birth rate and decline in the desire to have children are common problems faced by the whole world. It is closely related to the stage of economic development, people’s awareness and other socio-economic factors. For example, western developed countries generally face problems like labor shortage. In this context, why doesn’t the western media say something like “demographic loss will hinder economic growth”? Population is an important part of a country’s development, but whether it can be truly converted into economic development depends on the country’s political system and policy implementation. Past experiences have proved time and again that population can be an asset to a country’s development, as well as a heavy burden. Many developing countries, despite their large population, have not been able to develop due to factors such as education level, weak industry and business environment. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed concern about India’s “population explosion” in 2019. He said, “If people are not educated and healthy, neither the family nor the country will be happy.”
To judge China’s development prospects, we should not only focus on the single indicator of population size, but also pay attention to the quality and granularity of economic development. More than 240 million people in China have received higher education, and the average education years for the new labor force has reached 14 years. It can be seen that China’s “demographic dividend” has not disappeared, the size of the “talent dividend” is expanding, and the pace of development in China is still strong. China’s economic growth accelerated to 4.5% in the first quarter of this year, exceeding external expectations. In the future, China will say goodbye to labor-intensive industries, and it is an inevitable trend to move from the middle to the high level of the global industrial chain and supply chain.
(Credits-China Media Group, Beijing)
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