Parents holding their children play in the square of a residential community in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province. Photo: VCG
After having two daughters, 43-year-old father Yu Zhongquan in Dalian, Northeast China's Liaoning Province, welcomed his third son in July.
It is just better to have both girls and boys in my family, he told the Global Times, emphasizing that he loves his daughters very much.
"Our family's economic condition can support more children. Although breaking the second-child policy, my wife and I also wanted a third kid, so we have him," Yu said.
However, many Chinese refuse to have more than one kid, due to the heavy burden of raising kids.
Zhang Qian, a 34-year-old mother from Daqing, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province said, "If I could do it all over again, I would not get married and have a baby."
Checking homework, supervising her six-year-old daughter in practicing dancing skills and reciting ancient poems, Zhang has devoted all her leisure time at night and on weekends to her only kid.
"My husband helped little, holding the stereotype that a wife should take the main responsibility of taking care of kids in a family," Zhang said. "Nobody can manage to persuade me having another kid."
Yu and Zhang are reflections of young Chinese holding different concepts of family planning. However, like Zhang, many people of reproductive age in China are less enthusiastic about starting a family.
According to an article written by the Minister of Civil Affairs Li Jiheng, China's child-bearing age population has low fertility desire, the total birth rate has fallen below the warning line, and population development has entered a critical transition period.
China has actively responded to the disappearing demographic dividend and low fertility rate, partly by putting forth the concept of "inclusiveness" in the family planning policy for the first time, in its most recent Five-Year Plan.
Demographers reached by the Global Times predicted that the inclusive family planning policy would slow down the fertility rate decline to some extent, and the Chinese people are expecting a fertility-friendly society in an all-round way.