India: One Child Policy ???

Sept. 21, 2010 - PRLog -- By David Caploe PhD, Chief Political Economist, EconomyWatch.com

Of the many elements that have gone into China’s stunning – and stunningly fast – economic growth,

there is little doubt that the population-limiting “one child policy” has been one of the most important.

To be sure, it is now creating some aspects that are not especially pleasing to the Chinese political / business elite.

But these are quite predictable, and we suspect the ever-ingenious Chinese leadership SHOULD be able to figure out how to handle them.

And that is probably one reason why China’s fellow emerging Asian giant – and sometime competitor –

India is taking some serious steps towards limiting ITS population,

which has been growing almost as fast as the Indian economy itself,

hence limiting the per capita “value-added.”

While we doubt India will go to the legally repressive lengths to which China has gone,

often creating some human discomfort, if not misery, in the process,

it does make economic sense it is looking in this direction –

albeit doing so in a way consistent with its culture and tradition.

Sunita Laxman Jadhav is a door-to-door saleswoman who sells waiting.

She sweeps along muddy village lanes in her nurse’s white sari,

calling on newly married couples with an unblushing proposition:

Wait two years before getting pregnant, and the government will thank you.

It also will pay you.

“I want to tell you about our honeymoon package,”

began Ms. Jadhav, an auxiliary nurse, during a recent house call

on a new bride in Satara, a farming region in the state of Maharashtra.

Ms. Jadhav explained that the district government would pay 5,000 rupees, or about $106, if the couple waited to have children.

Waiting, she promised, would allow them time to finish their schooling or to save money.

Waiting also would allow India more time to curb a rapidly growing population

that threatens to turn its demography from a prized asset into a crippling burden.

With almost 1.2 billion people, India is disproportionately young;

roughly half the population is younger than 25.

This “demographic dividend” is one reason some economists predict that

India could surpass China in economic growth rates within five years.

India will have a young, vast work force

while a rapidly aging China will face the burden of supporting an older population.

But if youth is India’s advantage, the sheer size of its population poses looming pressures on resources

and presents an enormous challenge for an already inefficient government to expand schooling and other services.

In coming decades, India is projected to surpass China as the world’s most populous nation,

and the critical uncertainty is just how populous it will be.

Estimates range from 1.5 billion to 1.9 billion people,

and Indian leaders recognize that that must be avoided.

Yet, as we noted, unlike China, where the governing Communist Party long ago instituted the world’s strictest population policy,

India is an unruly democracy, where the central government has set population targets,

but where state governments carry out separate efforts to limit the birthrate.

While some states have reacted to population fears with coercion,

forbidding parents with more than two children from holding local office,

or disqualifying government workers from certain benefits if they have larger families,

other states have done little.

Meanwhile, many national politicians have been wary of promoting population control

ever since an angry public backlash against a scandal over forced vasectomies during the 1970s.

It was considered a sign of progress that

India’s Parliament debated “population stabilization” recently

after largely ignoring the issue for years.

“It’s already late,”

said Sabu Padmadas, a demographer with the University of Southampton who has worked extensively in India.

“It’s definitely high time for India to act.”

The program in Satara is a pilot program —

one of several initiatives across the country that have used a softer approach —

trying to slow down population growth by challenging deeply ingrained rural customs.

Experts say far too many rural women wed as teenagers, usually in arranged marriages,

and then have babies in quick succession — a pattern that exacerbates poverty,

and spurs what demographers call “population momentum” by bunching children together.

In Satara, local health officials have led campaigns to curb teenage weddings,

as well as promoting the “honeymoon package” of cash bonuses and

encouraging the use of contraceptives so that couples wait to start a family.

“This is how population stabilization will come,”

said Rohini Lahane, an administrator in the district health office.

India averages about 2.6 children per family,

far below what it was a half century ago,

yet still above the rate of 2.1 that would stabilize the population.

Many states with higher income and education levels

are already near or below an average of two children per family.

Yet the poorest and most populous states, notably Uttar Pradesh and Bihar,

average almost four children per family

and have some of the lowest levels of female literacy.

“An educated girl is your best contraception”  ...

To read more at http://www.economywatch.com’, go to:

http://www.economywatch.com/economy-business-and-finance-...

# # #

EconomyWatch.com is the world's largest global, independent, economics community. Every month we serve over 750k users, who read and discuss economics, investing and finance topics.