Rural population could drop to 400 mln
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The country's rural population may drop to 400 million from the current 900 million in the next three decades because of rising urbanization, a senior official has forecast.
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An elderly man from the countryside walks in a street in Renshou county, Sichuan province, with his granddaughter on his back, on Feb 4. Renshou county has a population of 1.62 million, with 1.33 million living in rural areas. |
In the past 30 years, the urban population has increased by 400 million to hit 600 million. Of these people, 27 percent now live in cities but are not permanent residents.
"Currently, one in four residents in the cities comes from the rural population. The current movement of labor from rural to urban areas is expected to continue in the future," Han said.
The country has about 240 million migrant workers, with about half of them born after 1980 and 40 million of them born in the 1990s, the latest official statistics show.
"Young migrant workers are reluctant to go back to the countryside and are eager to be new residents in cities," Han said.
A major policy document released last month addressed the young as "a new generation of migrant workers" for the first time and made it clear that the government is "striving for substantial reform of the household registration system" to help them to register in cities where they can then receive more social benefits.
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