Premier pledges hefty investment in social programs
Updated: 2008-03-06 16:15
- A total of 276.2 billion yuan will be appropriated this year in the central government budget to accelerate development of the social security system, 45.8 billion yuan more than last year.
- A total of 6.8 billion yuan will be allocated from the central government budget for the low-rent housing program this year, 1.7 billion yuan more than last year, and local governments will also increase funding in this area.
- China will provide safe drinking water for another 32 million rural residents and support the building of a number of large and medium-sized methane facilities to serve an additional 5 million rural families.
Jia Kang, director of the Research Institute for Fiscal Science under the Ministry of Finance, said that a more effective fiscal spending shall address more social "weak points", when the government is trying to ease the conflict between growing fiscal revenues and the risk of an overheating economy.
"By showing more concern over social welfare, we can achieve a sound balance between money supply and demand," said Jia, who is attending the annual session of China's top political advisory body.
After focusing almost exclusively on the pursuit of economic growth, China finds itself challenged by thorny issues that require long-term solutions. For instance, closing the urban-rural wealth gap, which hit 3.3:1 in 2006, compared with the international average of 1.8:1, is widely viewed as a huge hurdle, needing far-reaching and massive reform.
China needs to promote industrialization of agriculture, step up urbanization progress and ensure both urban and rural residents equal access to public services, which will require a steady growth of fiscal input in rural sector, Jia said.
"The investment in these fields is still not enough," he said.
To tackle chronic social issues, including the wealth gap, the ruling Communist Party and the government have repeatedly called for more efforts to be devoted to the promotion of "coordinated development" and building of "a harmonious society".
As specific measures, the government abolished the centuries-old taxes for farmers, and exempted all the 150 million pupils and middle school students in rural areas from tuition and miscellaneous fees.
Improvement has also been made in the new rural cooperative medical care system, which now covers 86 percent of China's counties and 730 million rural residents.
The government also launched campaigns to help migrant workers retrieve salaries in default and ordered migrant laborers to be included in social security network with industrial accident insurance.
A series of moves have helped boost the people's well-being and lives. The urban per capita annual net income rose from 7,703 yuan in 2002 to 13,786 yuan in 2007, and rural per capita annual net income rose from 2,476 yuan to 4,140 yuan during the same period.
"I believe the government will make greater efforts to resolve social issues and improve people's livelihood through increasing fiscal revenue and making use of other resources," Jia said.
|
||
|
|