This article reviews how the largest population of any country in the world passed from unchecked growth to planned control. Mao Zedong needed a large population to fulfil his political ambitions, and this led to criticism of Ma Yinchu, who advocated that China practise birth control. The Great Leap Forward resulted in three difficult years during which China lost more than 40 million lives. The subsequent unchecked growth of the population to over 900 million prompted China to implement family planning seriously from the 1970s. China has now included the population issue in its socioeconomic development project, calling on the people to give 'fewer births for more rapid improvement of welfare'. The article points out that radical measures are needed to achieve the goal of keeping the Chinese population below 1.6 billion in the year 2050.
