According to internationally accepted standards, when a country or region’s population of 65 years and over exceeds 7%, it means that it is aging; it reaches 14%, which is a deep aging; if it exceeds 20%, it enters a super-aging society.
According to the data from the seventh national census, a reporter from China Business News reported on 336 prefecture-level and above cities outside Sansha City (including municipalities directly under the Central Government, cities under separate state planning, provincial capitals, ordinary prefecture-level cities, states, and leagues except Sansha , Hereinafter referred to as "cities"). After combing through the age composition of the population, it is found that 149 cities across the country have entered a deep ageing stage, and 11 of them have entered the super-aging stage, namely Nantong, Ziyang, Taizhou, Zigong, and Urumqi. Lanchabu, Nanchong, Fushun, Deyang, Neijiang, Meishan and Dandong are mainly from the central Jiangsu region, Sichuan, Liaoning and Inner Mongolia.
Among them, Nantong, which ranks first, has a ratio of 22.67%, making it the most aging city in my country.
From the perspective of Nantong’s districts and counties, the central city and development zones have a relatively low degree of aging due to the influx of many laborers. Among them, the population of 65 years and over in Chongchuan District only accounts for 13.71%. The ratio is 10.23%.
But apart from these two districts, other districts and counties in Nantong have exceeded the 14% deep aging standard.
For example, in Rudong County under its jurisdiction, the proportion of the population aged 65 and over is as high as 29.98%, and the proportion of the population aged 60 and over has reached 38.91%, close to 40%; the proportion of the population aged 65 and over in Qidong City is 25.98%, 60 and over. The proportion of the population has reached 35.48%; the proportion of the population aged 65 and over in Hai'an City is 24.84%, and the proportion of the population aged 60 and over is 32.54%.
According to the "Report on the Status of Elderly Population Information and Aging Career Development in Jiangsu Province in 2018", as of the end of 2018, Nantong City had 1,321 centenarians, accounting for 22% of the province's total. It is a veritable hometown of longevity.
Nantong has a high degree of aging. On the one hand, the local family planning implementation was relatively strict in the past, and only children accounted for a relatively high proportion. Therefore, the birth rate of Nantong's population was relatively low, and this low birth rate inertia has continued to this day.
According to the 2019 Nantong Statistical Bulletin, the birth rate of the city’s population is 5.85‰, and the natural population growth rate is -2.75‰.
According to the data from the Seventh Census, the proportion of people aged 0-14 in Nantong is 10.9%, which is 7 percentage points lower than the national average.
However, according to the Seventh Census data, compared with the registered population, Nantong City has achieved a net inflow of permanent population for the first time, and the population structure has undergone a historic change.
Since 2018, the number of newly-increased jobs in the city has increased by more than 100,000 each year; there are 5 national-level development zones, 12 provincial-level development zones, and various types of district parks and various industries in the park. The characteristics have attracted many employed people.
Taizhou, which is located in the central Jiangsu region, also accounted for 22.01% of the population aged 65 and over; compared with 2010, the proportion of the population aged 60 and above increased by 7.43 percentage points, and the proportion of the population aged 65 and over increased by 7.78 percentage points.
In terms of sub-regions, except for the medical high-tech zone in Taizhou, the proportion of population aged 65 and over is less than 14%. The rest of the district and county-level cities are higher than 14%. Among them, Xinghua City has reached 25.53%, and Jiangyan District has also reached 24.42%.
In addition, although Yangzhou has not yet entered the super-aging process, it is only one step away from the super-aging threshold, which accounts for 20%.
Statistics show that in 2020, the population of Yangzhou aged 60 and above accounted for 26.01%, of which the population aged 65 and above accounted for 19.99%; compared with 2010, the proportion of population aged 60 and above increased by 7.03 percentage points, the proportion of population aged 65 and above An increase of 7.56 percentage points.
Why is the aging degree in central Jiangsu so high?
Niu Fengrui, a researcher at the Urban Development and Environment Research Center of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, analyzed to a reporter from China Business News that the relatively high degree of aging in Central Jiangsu and Yancheng in northern Jiangsu is related to the stricter implementation of family planning in the past and the higher proportion of only children.
In addition, many young people in this area flow to Shanghai, Suzhou and other places, so the degree of aging has increased.
Outside of Central Jiangsu, Sichuan and Liaoning also have more super-aging cities.
Among them, Ziyang City, Sichuan Province accounted for 22.62% of the population aged 65 and over, second only to Nantong, Jiangsu.
According to data from the Seventh Census, the permanent population of Ziyang in 2020 is 2,308,631, which is a decrease of 285,212, or 11.00%, compared with the sixth national census in 2010.
In terms of age structure, the proportion of permanent residents aged 15-59 decreased by 7.18%, the proportion of permanent residents aged 60 and above increased by 8.47%, and the proportion of permanent residents aged 65 and above increased by 9.23%.
In terms of district counties, the 15-59 year-old population in Anyue County only accounts for 51.54%, and the 15-59 year-old population in Lezhi County only accounts for 52.49%.
In other words, the proportion of the elderly and children in these two counties is close to half.
It can be seen that the decrease in the working population is an important factor in the significant increase in the aging degree of Ziyang City. Among them, with the rapid development of the economy of the strong provincial capital, a large number of people have flowed into Chengdu in Ziyang, which is adjacent to Chengdu.
In addition to Ziyang, Sichuan and Zigong, Nanchong, Deyang, Neijiang, and Meishan have also entered a super-aging society. The four cities of Suining, Bazhong, Guang'an, and Leshan account for more than 19% of the population aged 65 and over. .
In general, in the past ten years, most of Sichuan’s population has flowed into Chengdu, the provincial capital.
Over the past ten years, the permanent population of Chengdu has increased by 5.8189 million, which is the third largest among all cities in the country, second only to the first-tier cities of Shenzhen and Guangzhou.
Ye Qing, a professor at Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, analyzed China Business News that the central region is closer to the Yangtze River Delta, the Pearl River Delta and the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. In recent years, the construction of high-speed rail networks has further shortened the space-time distance. With rapid development and abundant employment opportunities, the population of many prefectures and cities has moved to provincial capitals.
For this reason, the age structure of the capital cities of Sichuan and the most populous provinces in central China is still relatively young.
The proportion of the population aged 65 and over in provincial capital cities is mostly below 14%, and the proportion of working-age population is still relatively high.
Liaoning is also a concentrated area of super-aging cities.
Among them, the proportion of people aged 65 and over in Fushun City reached 20.27%, ranking 7th in the country; Dandong also reached 20%; in addition, the proportion of Benxi, Jinzhou, and Liaoyang all exceeded 19%.
Unlike Sichuan, although the population of ordinary prefecture-level cities in Liaoning has also flowed into the two sub-provincial cities of Shenyang and Dalian, the degree of aging in these two cities is not low. Among them, Dalian is 65 years old and above. The proportion of the population has reached 16.87%, and this proportion in Shenyang has reached 15.47%, both of which are in the stage of deep aging.
In fact, a total of 36 cities in the three northeastern provinces have all entered a stage of deep aging.
Yi Baozhong, a professor at the Northeast Asia Research Institute of Jilin University, analyzed by China Business News that due to the economic downturn in Northeast China in recent years, there are not many job opportunities, so the young population continues to flow out. There are many, which will also affect the age structure of the population.
Author: Lin Xiaozhao