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There is a saying: Be careful what you wish for.
The Chinese, who have a neat turn of phrase, could have coined it. Apparently they did not - but they will come to realise its wisdom.
Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping introduced a one-child policy in 1979 to curb population growth. And Chinese society, like most other societies, tends to choose boys over girls.
With only one chance to get the gender right, many people, somehow or other, managed to ensure the birth of a boy. The result is a growing gender imbalance.
According to UK newspaper The Guardian, 115 Chinese boys are born for every 100 girls, while, in some provinces, the ratio is more than 130 to 100.
In a presentation on China last week, local business strategist Clem Sunter said: "Within 15 years, you will have 30 million more young men aged 20 to 25 than young women."
Though the use of ultrasound to establish the gender of a foetus is forbidden, the reality is that more women will gain access to the technology as the population urbanises. So the imbalance is likely to grow.
China will find itself living in interesting times.
With a population of 1.3 billion people, it does not risk a rapid population decline. But the mismatch between the sexes will create some unusual social problems.
China, which is running a large trade surplus with the rest of the world, may be forced to add a new item to its imports: brides.
But it will be able to tap its huge foreign exchange reserves - now $1 trillion (R7.3 trillion) - to pay bride prices.
Sunter points out that the policy raises a second demographic issue: "When the present generation of 20 to 30 year olds is 60 or 70, there won't be a rush of people coming through to keep the economy on track."There is already a change in the shape of the traditional population pyramid. The Guardian says: "China has more than 88 million people aged 65 or over, equivalent to about 7 percent of the population. By 2050 this is set to exceed 300 million, or 25 percent".
The demographic shift represents a problem, one many European countries have already discovered. As the pool of working-age people shrinks, relative to the elderly, retirement provision becomes increasingly problematic.
The country's rapid growth has created a host of new opportunities and challenges - to China itself and to the rest of the world.
In 1978, it was the 100th ranked economy in the world. Today it is fourth and moving into third place, ahead of Germany.
"Every business in the world will have to realise it is better to have China as a customer than a competitor," says Sunter.
It is likely to overtake the US as the world's largest economy by 2040, he says - and the process will change the world.
"This is a country that has had no immigration, no external influences for 5 000 years," says Sunter. The lack of interaction makes it difficult for outsiders to understand China and Chinese ways of doing things.
Finding out how to engage will become a priority for the country's trading partners.
Among them is South Africa, which is already preparing for the future. Sunter says at least three private schools have already put Mandarin Chinese on the syllabus.
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