The progress in research on assisted reproductive technology (ART) as well as its application would be sped up for the next few years, says Shanghai's family planning bureau.
According to an official statement released by the Shanghai Municipality Commission of Health and Family Planning, study about ART would be expanded and fast-tracked while its technology regulation would be strengthened to achieve full establishment of the innovation by 2018.
As part of this plan, the government seeks to establish up to eight more formal institutions which would provide ART services to Shanghai residents and pursue research about the topic in addition to the nine which are functioning in the city.
This comes amid the worsening population imbalance in the city where only 4.18 million women are in their child-bearing age as of the bureau's records in 2012.
Ten percent of this population is infertile, or unable to bear a child, resulting in about 400,000 families in Shanghai with no one to continue their bloodline.
Though this percentage is not even a quarter of the city's child-bearing population, this still comes as a big problem for the city since it needs all the eligible women to pursue having a baby because of the escalating issue on age imbalance.
This is a massive dilemma not only in Shanghai, but also all over China, as recent records show that the country's population is mainly composed of people aged 60 or above, with only a small percentage of those in their working age.
In order to maximize all females of child-bearing age, the city has decided to make use of the latest technology now known as assisted reproductive technology, which enables even infertile women to get pregnant, though Shanghai still wants to ensure quality and strict regulation of the ART.