Xiangzhou District, Zhuhai

Zhuhai attracted 90,100 new permanent residents last year; the annual growth rate of 5.4 percent was the largest in the past five years.

According to the 2017 Zhuhai Economic & Social Development Statistical Bulletin recently published by the Statistics Bureau, Zhuhai had a permanent resident population of 1.77 million at the end of 2017, compared with 1.68 million in 2016.

The current population, though not evenly distributed (Xiangzhou District in the east has less than one-third of the city's land area, but nearly half the population) is young and robust.

The 2015 results of the 1 Percent National Population Sample Survey released by the bureau show that aging residents (aged over 65) make up only 6.65 percent of the total population. Meanwhile, as of the end of August last year, a quarter of the city's residents, numbering 632,700, were at-school students.

It is a positive sign as the Guangdong Population Development Plan (2017-30) punctuates optimal population structure, quality, and distribution. Population should grow evenly in step with coordinated social development to further spur economic activity, according to the plan.

To attract quality newcomers and bolster the economy, the municipal government introduced the Approval Methods of Introducing Talents to Zhuhai on March 1 of last year. Since then, 18,727 talents have been drawn to the city, attracted by easy household registration procedures, living allowances, and desirable working conditions. That was a hike of 46.5 percent in the number of newly arrived talents over the previous year.

The plan predicts that Zhuhai will have a population of 1.8 million residents by 2020.

A large number of young talents are stimulating Zhuhai's economic development. [Photo courtesy southcn.com]