China finds nearly 12 million children it didn’t know existed

China underestimated the number of children born between 2000 and 2010 by at least 11.6 million, equivalent to Belgium’s current population, in part due to its strict one-child policy.

The most recent statistical yearbook published by the Government places the number of children born during that period at 172.5 million, well above the 160.9 million in that age group recorded in the 2010 census.

The difference could be because some parents do not register births to avoid punishment for violating the one-child policy. China only began allowing all couples to have a second child in 2016, meaning that some parents did not officially register newborns if they exceeded the quota until the child was six years old and needed to enroll in school, according to the independent demographer He Yafu.

Approximately 57% of the later registered boys were girls, indicating that the discrepancy could be partly related to the fact that the parents did not register the girls so that they could continue trying to have a boy.

In addition, the 2010 census was conducted on November 1 of that year, so it would not have included the births of the last two months of the year. Census surveys also do not usually include people who have died or emigrated in the intervening years.

Reviews show how difficult it is to accurately count the number of people in the world’s most populous country. Birth rates for the years 2011 to 2017 were also revised up in the last statistical yearbook, suggesting that the problem of undervaluing the number of children likely continued after 2010.

However, now that China is effectively abandoning limits on family size, there could be fewer discrepancies in the future. While the limit for most families is currently set at three children, there are no penalties for exceeding it.

However, the number of births is expected to continue to decline in China and the total population could start to shrink from this year.