The nation's aging future in a nutshell

Tong Zhaolian, a 94-year-old veteran, burnishes a memorial medal he received for the 60th anniversary of the victory of China's Resistance War Against Japanese Aggression in Rudong, Jiangsu province on Sep 30, 2014. [Photo/Xinhua]

Rudong county was a pioneer in the implementation of the national family planning policy, and as such it offers a microcosm of one of the biggest problems facing the country in the years to come. 

From nine to seven, then from seven to four: The reduction in the number of senior high schools in Rudong county, Jiangsu province, in the past four years has been a cruel but irreversible trend in the eyes of Chen Jian, deputy head of the county's education bureau.

"There are not enough students. Keeping all these schools open would have wasted a lot of resources," he said.

From 1986 to 2009 Chen taught English at the Rudong Senior High School, one of the county's two best senior high schools, before becoming the principal.

Rudong Senior High is one of the best high schools in Jiangsu, with more than 90 percent of its graduates winning places at colleges or universities, and many of them gaining admission to China's best universities. The school's record of academic excellence encouraged a large number of ambitious parents to arrange for their children to study there.

"Five or six years ago, our school had a maximum of 27 classes in one grade, and each class had nearly 70 students," Chen said.

The numbers were swollen by students from outside the district whose parents used every means available to enable their children to attend the school in the hope they would learn how to score high marks in the gaokao, China's annual national college entrance exam, and attend a top institution.

But that's all history now. This fall semester, the school's 10th grade has only 17 classes, each of which has only about 50 students.

"In addition to the declining number of local students, a ban on accepting non-locals that came into force in 2014 has also contributed to the shortfall," Chen said, adding that the county's junior high schools have been affected by the same trend. Statistics from the education bureau show that in recent years the number of students eligible to attend the county's junior high schools has been shrinking by 1,000 students annually.

Chen, who has devoted nearly three decades to education, believes the present situation is sad, but said there's nothing he or his colleagues can do.

Sitting in a meeting room at the education bureau's wood-floored office building, the 50-something Rudong native shook his head when asked how the situation developed. "The birth rate is too low. Every year, the number of newborns is only half the number of deaths in the county."

Rudong was once renowned as one of the counties that had best implemented the national family-planning policy that restricted most couples to one child.

In fact, the county was a pioneer. Although China's family planning program officially started in the 1970s, Rudong voluntarily introduced the policy in the 1960s. The move resulted in a low birthrate in the 1970s, just as other parts of China were just beginning to implement the policy.

Chen Youhua, a professor of demographics at Nanjing University, said that only three factors can change the age structure of a region's population－birth, death, and emigration.