The numbers game

China is an enormous country, sprawling across a fair chunk of the globe, yet it often feels overwhelmingly, stiflingly crowded.

Unlike their Japanese neighbours, crammed in on a relatively small slither of land and yet still fanatically well-behaved and respectful of each others’ privacy, the Chinese have no concept of personal space.

And if you’re unlucky enough to be a ’foreigner’ in this land you will find yourself under constant surveillance from thousands of inquisitive pairs of eyes. Smile, you’re on 24-hour TV.

But whilst you’re an object of attention don’t expect any special privileges, particularly when it comes to travelling around. You’re just another animal fighting in the frenzy for a place at the water trough.

When the bus or train hoves into view, you must resolutely suppress your English sense of justice and fair play, forget any pretence at politeness and never ever attempt to queue. Rather, roll up your sleeves, dive into the maelstrom and bash them out the way with 50 pounds of backpack.

This may seem the very height of rudeness but in China it seems vital for survival as demand outstrips supply.

As we push our way through the throngs crowding outside train stations, bus stations and just about every point in between we frequently find ourselves asking: just how many people live here?

Travelling around China has become for us a bit of a numbers game. In a country of 1.3 billion the population of the average city in this country seems to put their European equivalent in the shade.

20 million in Shanghai…17 million in Beijing…higher!, Brucie, higher!…8 million in Xi’an…10 million in Chengdu…5 million in Chongqing.

Chongqing? A few months ago I’d not even heard of it yet this is a city which, if you extend it to the municipality, numbers some 30 million souls - equivalent to half that of the entire UK.

Like many others cities we passed through Chongqing seems to be further expanding. Above the murky brown waters of the Yangtze the skyline is crowded by cranes constructing high rises for the burgeoning population.

Further up the river, we passed two huge power stations in quick succession, each surrounded by massive heaps of coal. Such is the scale of China’s population growth and economic expansion it is building on average two of these CO2-spewing monsters every week.

Jung Chang, in her extraordinary account of living in Mao’s China, Wild Swans, apportions considerable blame for the population explosion to the Cultural Revolution.

One of the effects of the many barmy policies introduced by the revered Chairman was to loosen birth control, hence increasing the population by 200 million.

Not that subsequent leaders haven’t recognised the need to act. The Chinese government maintains its one child policy has been at least a partial success, claiming it has prevented 400 million births since its introduction in 1979. However, despite this the population is set to creep up yet further.

It all left me wondering: how is china going to cope with population growth on this scale? Where will it find the resources need to sustain this growth? How will the country meet the growing consumer demands of its citizens as economic growth allows more of them to aspire to Western standards of living?

And, for those of us in the West, how will we cope?