As some labor-intensive multinational manufacturing enterprises have been withdrawing from China, the public is worried about how long China’s demographic dividend can last.

In a recent report on population policy, a think tank affiliated with China’s State Council is proposing to ease the one-child restrictions in areas where controls have been strictest and eventually ban child limits altogether, reported Xinhua News Agency.

The report, issued by the China Development Research Foundation, believes the gradual loosening of the family planning policy can avoid dramatic changes that a full end to the policy may bring. Two steps were brought up – couples in cities and rural areas where the one-child policy has been strictly conducted can have their second babies immediately, and couples in other areas can share the same treatment by 2015, according to the report.

The report points to China’s plummeting birth rate, rapidly aging population and a widening gender imbalance, implying that the one-child policy has been out of date.

Cai Fang, director of the Population and Labor Economy Research Institute with Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, brought up concerns over the economic implications of China’s demographic dividend.

According to a U.N. prediction, China’s overall dependency ratio - the ratio of working-age people to those younger than 14 and over 65 - bottomed out in 2011, Cai told China Youth Online, which means China’s demographic dividend has ended. It can be proved by the fact that China has lost advantages in labor-intensive industries due to rising labor costs.

China has taken steps in recent years to loosen the one-child control, including by allowing couples who are both only children to apply to have a second child. Rural couples whose first child is a girl and ethnic minority couples have long been allowed to have more than one child.