China's 21st Century Business Herald on September 12, cited statistics from the Urban and Rural Statistics Yearbook issued by China's Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, which disclosed that between 2014 and 2018, 451 cities had “urban expansion and population growth,” 87 cities had “urban expansion and population shrinkage,” 18 cities had “urban contraction and population growth,” and 13 cities had “urban contraction and population shrinkage.” It said in 2018, the total newly constructed urban area was 58,456 square kilometres, an increase of 53.4 per cent over 2009, while the permanent urban population was 510 million, only 35.8 per cent higher than ten years ago. This indicated a phenomenon in which “land urbanization was faster than population urbanization.” In comparing the data between 2018 and 2014, one can find that the number of cities with urban population reduction is twice the number of cities with urban area reduction. 122 cities experienced a decrease in urban permanent population during those five years; five cities showed little change, and 507 cities maintained a positive population growth. Among them, Longjing City in Jilin province, Jieyang City in Guangdong province and Honghu City in Hubei province are the only three cities whose population has decreased by more than 50 per cent. Most of those with a declining population are the third and fourth-tier cities. Two main types of cities exhibited more urban population losses: cities in northeast China where young people are leaving en masse; and the smaller cities in the Pearl River Delta, whose population is being absorbed by the two top-tier cities of Guangzhou and Shenzhen.
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