Local Educational Reforms Seek to Support "One Child Policy," Address Preference for Boys

According to a report in the Beijing News, Guilin city (Guangxi province) has instituted lower educational fees for agricultural laborers (nongye renkou) adhering to the one-child policy. Those families with one child receive a 20 percent reduction in school fees, while those with two girls receive a 10 percent reduction.

The reforms reflect the efforts of some Chinese localities to shift toward incentive-based systems in the implementation of the one-child policy to reduce and to help address the severely distorted male-female ratios among Chinese children. Guangxi province has 125.57 male children born for every 100 female ones, significantly higher than the national rate of 116.86 to 100.