China to survey family development

BEIJING -- A nationwide follow-up survey on family development is expected to be launched in China starting in 2014, China's family planning commission has announced.

The survey, the first of its kind, will track an average of 1,000 households across 30 provinces in order to better understand the country's population and family structure, according to a statement publicized on the website of the National Health and Family Planning Commission (NHFPC) on Wednesday.

Items on topics such as health, parenting, elderly care, gender differences and income distribution of family members will be polled, according to the statement, adding that a national database will be created based on the poll.

The survey will be jointly conducted by the NHFPC and the China Population and Development Research Center (CPDRC). A pilot survey was launched last week in northeast China's Liaoning Province.

Liu Hongyan, vice director of the CPDRC, urged researchers to report the real situation of families in Liaoning and ensure the authenticity of data at the launching ceremony, adding that the pilot survey will provide important experience for the formal survey in 2014.

China's family planning policy was first introduced in the late 1970s to rein in the surging population by limiting most urban couples to one child and most rural couples to two children, if the first child born was a girl.

The policy was later relaxed, with the current policy stipulating that to have a second child, both parents must be only children.