Number of migrants drops

China's migrant population - people who left their hometown to seek employment or education elsewhere - decreased for the first time in about 30 years in 2015, a change that surprised demographers and economists.

The country's migrant population dropped to 247 million at the end of last year, a decrease of 5.68 million, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

The overall reduction of the migrant population arrived a year earlier than expected, said Li Xunlei, chief economist with Haitong Securities. The number of people moving to cities was dwindling at a pace of about 2 million per year since the peak of 12 million more migrants annually in 2010, Li said.