6.2.3

Population Policies

Test yourself

Pro-natalist and Anti-natalist Government Policies

Government policies, on how many babies people should have, can affect the population growth of a country. Pro-natalist policies encourage people to have more children, anti-natalist policies do the opposite.

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Pro-natalist

  • Pro-natalist policies are used by some countries to encourage couples to have more children.
  • Pro-natalist policies can be successful but factors beyond offering financial rewards are normally more important.
    • E.g. France had a pro-natalist policy (“Code de la famille”) that started in 1939.
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Code de la famille

  • Families were given incentives like:
    • Paid up to £1064 for having a third child.
    • Three-child families were given family allowances to increase their buying power.
    • Mothers were given maternity pay (at nearly full pay) for 20 weeks for their first child and for 40 weeks or more for a third child.
    • Preferential treatment when bidding for council flats with three bedrooms.
    • Three-child families got a 30% fare reduction on all public transport.
    • Mothers and housewives received a full pension scheme.
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Anti-natalist policies

  • Anti-natalist policies have been used by some countries to actively discourage people from having children.
  • Anti-natalist policies aim to reduce the country’s population.
  • E.g. China introduced the ‘One Child Policy’ in 1979.
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China's One Child Policy

  • Incentives:
    • Parents of one child received larger pensions.
    • Only children received the best education for free.
  • Penalties for having more than one child:
    • Parents had their benefits taken away.
    • The family’s income was fined by up to 15%.
    • Abortions became compulsory for a second pregnancy, and there was a lot of worry that many of these were forced abortions.
  • The legal age of marriage was raised to 22 for men and to 20 for women, and they had to have state permission.
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Impacts of the One Child Policy

  • It worked. 300 million births were prevented and China's population has stabilised at 1.4 billion people.
  • Problems:
    • Accusations that China violated human rights with forced abortions and causing female infanticide because people would rather have a male child.
    • The current ratio of men to women is 118:100.
    • The current fertility rate (1.6) is below the replacement rate of 2.1, leading to an ageing population.
    • By 2040, the ratio of worker to retiree will be 2:1.

Jump to other topics

1Paper 1 - Changing River Environnments

2Paper 1 - Changing Coastal Environments

3Paper 1 - Changing Ecosystems

4Paper 1 - Tectonic Hazards

5Paper 1 - Climate Change

6Paper 2 - Changing Populations

7Paper 2 - Changing Towns & Cities

8Paper 2 - Development

9Paper 2 - Changing Economies

10Paper 2 - Resource Provision

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