Micah McCartney is a Newsweek journalist in Taipei, Taiwan. It covers US-Chinese relations, security disorders of East Asia and Southeast Asia, and the links between the characteristics between China and Taiwan. You can touch Micah by sending an email to Mr. McCartney@newsweek. com.

According to the facts, it was observed and verified first-hand through the journalist or informed and verified from competent sources.

The Chinese government has announced a roadmap to expand for the elderly, amid fears that the developing proportion of retirees could weigh on the world’s second-largest economy.

Newsweek communicated with the email of the China Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a comment application.

China’s population is aging rapidly, with citizens aged 65 and older already accounting for 14 percent of its 1.4 billion people. The country is expected to join the ranks of “super-aged” societies like Japan and South Korea in the coming years.

As more individuals leave the workforce than ever before, straining pension systems, the government has increased investment in elder care and related industries to manage the pressure.

China’s Ministry of Civil Affairs on Thursday announced a set of rules to the country’s reform of elderly care services.

Vice Minister Tang Chengpei called for a “comprehensive” technique with elderly care services, which ties together the social security and fitness systems well and increases “money saving,” according to a report through the state-run Xinhua news agency.

The reforms, which Tang emphasized must be implemented before the end of the next decade for maximum effect, include a three-tier system for elderly care from the village to township to county levels. This should involve increased coordination between institutional care centers and home and community-based care workers.

The new guidelines also stress technological innovation, such as artificial intelligence, humanoid robots, and brain-computer interfaces, to improve elder care services.

China is already a global leader in industrial automation, having overtaken Japan and Germany in 2024 to achieve the world’s third-highest robot density, according to the International Federation of Robotics.

Decades of the One-Child Policy have exacerbated China’s demographic challenges. Despite ending the policy in 2016 and later allowing families to have two and then three children, few young Chinese are having bigger families. Rising urban living costs, stagnating wages, and a focus on personal well-being and leisure have all been cited as factors. As a result, the country’s fertility rate fell to just 1.0 child per woman in 2023—well below the 2.1 needed to sustain the population—leaving fewer young people to care for both children and aging parents.

Local governments have brought policies, ranging from money subsidies to measures to develop the flexibility of the office for new parents in safe areas. In some cases, even the garden of personal infants is soaked, it is changed to breastfeeding houses to assume the wave of the elderly.

Tang Chengpei, vice minister of civil affairs: “The aging of the population is accelerating. We must make full use of an important window period around 2035. Be prepared for a more systematic response.”

Cao Heping, Peking University economist told the Global Times: “Deepening reforms in eldercare service is a vital step in jump-starting the next round of growth for the world’s second-largest economy.”

By the middle of the second century, 28% of Chinese are expected to be 65 years of age or older, according to the World Health Organization.

China’s growing retiree population is sure to strain its economy, prompting Beijing to raise statutory retirement ages for the first time since they were established in the 1950s. The government’s push to direct more state capital into the silver economy is expected to streamline the sector and reduce the cost of elderly care services, Beijing-based economist Tian Yun told the Global Times.

“China’s conversion age design will slow economic growth,” Xiujian Peng, a senior fellow at the Centre for Policy Studies at Victoria University in Melbourne, Australia, told Reuterers.

He pointed out that the number of young people will continue towards the domestic market, while the gray of Chinese hard work means that the country has “less inventions to innovate and an improvement in slower productivity, without faster. “

Micah McCartney is a Newsweek reporter in Taipei, Taiwan. It covers the relations between the United States and China, the Safety problems of the East and Southeast Asia, and the ties of China-Taiwan line. You can touch Micah by sending an email to m. mccartney@newsweek . com.

Micah McCartney is a Newsweek reporter in Taipei, Taiwan. It covers the relations between the United States and China, the Safety problems of the East and Southeast Asia, and the ties of China-Taiwan line. You can touch Micah by sending an email to m. mccartney@newsweek . com.