China Population
China is the most populous country in the world, with 1.25909
billion people at the end of 1999, about 22 percent of the world's total.
This figure does not include many Chinese in the Hong Kong Special Administrative
Region, TaiwanProvince and Macao Special Administrative Region.
The population density in China is 130 people per sq km. This population, however, is unevenly distributed. Along the densely populated east coast there are more than 400 people per sq km; in the central areas, over 200; and in the sparsely populated plateaus in the west there are less than 10 people per sq km.
When New China was founded in 1949, China had a population
of 541.67 million. Owing to China's stable society, rapid production development,
improvement of medical and health conditions, insufficient awareness of
the importance of population growth control and shortage of experience,
the population grew rapidly, reaching 806.71 million in 1969. In the early
1970s, the Chinese government realized that the over-rapid population growth
was harmful to economic and social development, and would cause great difficulties
in the fields of employment, housing, communications and medical care; and
that if China could not effectively check the over-rapid population growth,
and alleviate the tremendous pressure that the population growth was exerting
on land, forests and water resources, the worsening of the ecology and the
environment in the coming decades would be disastrous, thus endangering
the necessary conditions for the survival of humanity, and sustainable social
and economic development. Then the Chinese government began implementing
a family planning, population control and population quality improvement
policy in accordance with China's basic conditions of being a large country
with a poor economic foundation, a large population and little cultivated
land, so as to promote the coordinated development of the economy, society,
resources and environment. Since then birth rates have steadily declined
year by year. China's birth rate dropped from 34.11 per thousand in 1969
to 15.23 per thousand at the end of 1999; and the natural growth rate decreased
from 26.08 per thousand to 8.77 per thousand, thus basically realizing a
change in the population reproduction type to one characterized by low-birth,
low-death and low-increase rates.
Speaking
of the population, it is necessary to introduce the unique Chinese horoscope,
which is represented by 12 different animals. Every person has his own horoscope.
In traditional Chinese culture 12 is an important number when calculating
time. There are 12 full moons in a year, the length of time between the
full moons are relatively constant. They also observed the day could be
divided into 12 equal parts. These observations led to the development of
the 12 month lunar year and the 12 watch day. The Chinese began grouping
years into a twelve year cycle, assigning each year an animal symbol. Legend
has it that Buddha called a meeting of the whole world's animals to determine
how to restore order to the world, but only 12 heeded his call and they
came to represent the 12-year-cycle, with each presiding over a year in
the order they arrived at the meeting. The strong ox was in the lead and
only had a river to cross to come in first, but little did he know, the
cunning rat hitched a ride on his back and became the first to arrive.
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