Divorced Shanghai residents who remarry will be allowed to have a second child with a new spouse, Shanghai authorities announced recently in another sign that China’s controversial one-child-per-couple rule is easing.

The change in the law reflects a societal shift in large cities such as Shanghai, where divorce rates are climbing and incomes increasing after two decades of economic reform. Under a 2001 law, local governments are allowed some freedom in applying the one-child policy in order to bring it into line with prevailing social conditions.

Since the 1970s, China has enforced the one-child policy to curb the growth of the population, now at 1.3 billion people, and the government claims that the policy has prevented 300 million births over the last 10 years.

Despite the ease in Shanghai, officials say China’s one-child policy still stands.
(Source: U.N. Wire, 13 April)