China officially ended its controversial one child policy, allowing couples to have a second child amid deepening demographic crisis of shrinking workforce and ageing population in the world’s second-largest economy.

Legislative approval

Chinese lawmakers passed a historic decision allowing all couples to have two children from January 1, ending its over three-and-half decades old policy that prevented over 400 million births in the country.

“The state advocates that one couple shall be allowed to have two children,” the state-run Xinhua news agency quoted the newly revised Law on Population and Family Planning as saying.

The law was passed by the 159-member National People’s Congress Standing Committee, the top organ of China’s Parliament.

The NPC approval was a formality as the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC), headed by President Xi Jinping, had already approved an end to the policy in October.

Despite massive publicity to the lifting of the one-child policy being implemented since 1978, the-two child rule has evoked less enthusiasm with official surveys indicating that people were not keen to have second child due to heavy costs involved in bringing up another child. — AFP