Expectations are high that China could relax the family planning policy that allows most couples to have only one child. According to senior officials from the National Health and Family Planning Commission, the government is reviewing the population policy and considering adjusting it "at an appropriate time".

The family planning policy was introduced in the late 1970s to slow the pace of population growth. Later, the government relaxed the policy and allowed couples in some rural areas to have a second child if the first was a girl. The government relaxed the rules again in the early 2000s and allowed couples - if both were from single-child families - to have a second child. Nevertheless, the big picture is that a large proportion of the population, particularly the majority of couples living in cities, still cannot have more than one child.

The policy has had a huge impact on China's demographic profile, with the most apparent being on the total fertility rate. The fertility rate, which measures the number of children born to an average woman and is a key driver of population change, has fallen to 1.6 compared with about 2.4 for other countries at the same level of development as China but without population controls. The current fertility rate is also well below the replacement level of 2.2, which would lead, other things being equal, to a stable population.