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The Population Situation in China Essay

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The Population Situation in China

Introduction
A country is said to be overpopulated when the number of people in an area exceeds that area's resource capacity to sustain human activities at a decent standard of living.(1) When the population cannot be maintained without rapidly depleting nonrenewable resources or converting renewable resources into nonrenewable resources quickly enough, measures must be taken either to control the population or increase the area's resources. The People's Republic of China experienced a population explosion after World War II that sent its population doubling to 550 million in 1950. The country's growth of 14 million per year is equal to a new Australia every year.(2) With the rapidly developing …show more content…

Much of the population is clustered along the Pacific coast and in several fertile river valleys that extend inland, such as the Huang and the Yangtze. The most populous regions are in the rural areas where farming and other primary industries make for a source of livelihood. Eight major cities support more than two million inhabitants, but three-fourths of the population live in the rural areas.(6) The population is distributed with more than 400 people per square kilometer in the coastal areas and the east and more sparsely populated in the plateau areas in the west with fewer than 10 people per square kilometer.(7) China's population is growing at the rate of 1.4 percent per year. In 1994, its fertility rate was on replacement level, with an average of 1.84 children per woman.(8) Below shows, in general, the composition of the population in China:(9) By Gender Male, 51.03% Female, 48.97% By Region Cities and Towns, 29.04% Countrysides, 70.96% By Age Below 14 years, 26.81% 15-64 years, 66.96% Above 65 years, 6.23%

China is a United, Multinational Country of 56 Ethnic Groups
According to the survey, in 1995, the Zhuang ethnic group, the largest of the 55 ethnic groups, has 15.556 million people, while the Lhoba, the smallest, has only 2,322 people.

Problems Related to China's Overpopulation
With such a vast population, China's limited natural

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