About Population Policy

China's Agenda 21 on population part

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Updated: 2010-08-20 15:02

China's Agenda 21 – White Paper on China's Population, Environment, and Development in the 21st Century

Date: Adopted at the Executive Meeting of the State Council of the People's Republic of China

on 25 March 1994

CHAPTER 7 POPULATION, CONSUMPTION AND SOCIAL SERVICES

INTRODUCTION

7.1 Full consideration should be given to the population factor at all planning and decision-making stages. The relationship between population, resources, environment and development should be appropriately coordinated so as to lessen population pressures, which is an important aspect of ensuring sustainable social and economic development in the socialist modernization drive.

7.2 China has made well-known achievements with regard to population control due to her positive and effective population control policies and family planning management and services. Nevertheless, three major problems (viz., the extremely large population base, low levels of competence, and the unbalanced population structure) are now and will continue to be urgent issues for a rather long time in the future.

7.3 Changes in consumption patterns, like population growth, play an important role in the sustainable development of the economy. Rational consumption patterns not only benefit a growing national economy, but also reduce various pressures arising from population growth and protect and improve the environment upon which humankind depends. Unfortunately, however, the rapid growth of population together with non-sustainable consumption has become a tremendous burden on the supply of limited energy and resources. In particular, low-efficiency but high-consuming production and irrational domestic consumption have caused severe damage to the environment, thus affecting the conditions for improving living standards and even for sustaining human life itself.

7.4 Based on an enhanced understanding of the aforementioned issues, the Chinese Government plans to take necessary measures and actions to alter traditional irrational consumption practices and encourage more reasonable and sustainable consumption behaviour. Special attention should be focused on consumption in poverty-stricken and backward areas. Strategies should be developed to change inappropriate consumption patterns and lessen the burden on resources and the environment, so as to improve economic development and living standards and to alleviate poverty.

7.5 The Chinese Government has determined that striving for a sustainable, rapid and healthy development of national economy is a strategic goal. "Continuously improving living standards, strictly controlling population growth and strengthening environmental protection" has become fundamental tasks to be completed during the accelerated process of reform and opening up to promote economic development and all-round social progress. Family planning and environmental protection are regarded as basic national policies.

7.6 To satisfy the needs of a growing population, the Chinese Government attaches great importance to improving people's food, clothing and housing conditions, to enriching entertainment, physical education, health care, as well as to the development of tertiary industries and social services in order to provide people with full and convenient services. As the national economy rapidly develops, these demands will become more urgent.

7.7 Population, consumption and social services involve a wide range of issues and aspects. Therefore this chapter is interrelated with or cross-referenced to other chapters, therefore it should be studied with other chapters in mind. While drawing up programme areas, due consideration should be given to issues such as employment, human resources development, urbanization of population, health care, the protection of women and children, average per capita consumption, consumption structure, etc.. Similarly, in the preparation and execution of the other programme areas, the impacts of population, consumption and social conditions should also be taken into account.

7.8 The following 3 programme areas are included in this chapter:

A. Control of Population Growth and Improvement of Competence Level;

B. Establishment of Sustainable Consumption Patterns;

C. Actively Developing Social Services and Tertiary Industry.

PROGRAMME AREAS

A. Control of Population Growth and Improvement of Competence Level Basis for action

7.9 As a developing country with a large population, China is faced with the arduous tasks of dealing in a coordinated way with population control, resource utilization, environmental protection and economic development.

7.10 In the 1990's, China is facing its third peak in the birth-rate since the founding of the People's Republic of China. It is estimated that the Chinese population will approach 1.3 billion by the year 2000 and 1.5-1.6 billion by the middle of the next century.

7.11 With this continuous growth in total population, the labour force will be increasing steadily. A relatively higher rate of economic development must be maintained and more job opportunities should be created to meet the demands of the increasing labour force. There is an urgent need to formulate strategies and take actions to deal with the disparity between greater supply of and less demand for labour.

7.12 A decrease in the birth rate is changing the age structure of the population, and there will be a tendency towards an ageing population. By the end of 1991, the Chinese population at or above 60 years old stood at 100 million. By the turn of the century, the number will be 130 million, or approximately 10 per cent of the total population.

7.13 A large proportion of the Chinese population has a relatively low level of education. The semi-illiterate and illiterate population numbers over 180 million (1990), 36% of which are employed in rural areas. Therefore, improvement of education is fundamental to rural people being able shake off poverty and live a more comfortable life.

7.14 In the last 20 years, the Chinese Government has taken a series of measures and achieved remarkable progress in areas such as reducing the pressures imposed by population growth upon the environment, increasing public awareness of population policies, raising contraception rate, improving prenatal care and birth practices, improving education and health care for children, and improving educational levels throughout the country.

7.15 Since the 1980's, the reform and opening-up process has given rise to population flows and migrations. Such movements prove to be both necessary and beneficial to economic prosperity and social progress. Therefore, corresponding strategies and measures should taken to better steer and manage the floating segment of the population, to coordinate distribution of population and availability of resources in urban and rural areas, and to better deal with new and difficult problems encountered in the urbanization process.

7.16 In rural areas, and particularly in poverty-stricken areas, special efforts should be devoted to family planning issues, such as, the prevention of early marriages and of early and excessive births, and of marriages between close relatives. At the same time, measures should be taken to transform in a fundamental way backward educational conditions and to raise educational levels.

Objectives

7.17 Every effort will be made to keep the average annual rate of population growth within 1.25 per cent by the year 2000. The total birth rate will be reduced from 2.3 in 1990 to below 2.0, the average birth rate in developed countries at present. It is expected that the Chinese population will be stabilized at around 1.5 or 1.6 billion by the middle of next century. The population policy includes genetic counselling, childbirth counselling, and education about child-rearing practices with the aim of improving general health and educational levels. Research will be conducted on the problems associated with an ageing population.

7.18 By the end of the century, illiteracy amongst young and middle-aged women will be basically eliminated, and the goal of 9 years of compulsory education will be basically achieved. At the same time, levels of education throughout the country will be improved by enhancing various forms of education and vocational training, including the education of women and children.

7.19 Population control policy and environmental protection:

The family planning policy will be continued so as to reach the objectives for population control. Based on China's present condition and level of economic development, consideration must be given to the control of the birth rate, to raising health and educational levels, and to the solution of problems associated with an ageing population. A comprehensive plan will be formulated for achieving rational growth, improving levels of competence and optimizing the composition of the population;

Research and analysis on the current population, including the migrant population, will be conducted in order to provide a sound basis for making decisions on issues such as population control, job creation and urbanization. Inter-sectorial collaboration will be strengthened, and more opportunities for educational activities and exchanges of information amongst people from different backgrounds will be presented in order to increase public awareness of opportunities to participate in the control of population;

Government capabilities in terms of population management will be strengthened through clear definition of obligations and the adoption of well-coordinated management mechanisms.

7.20 Family planning and health care of women and children:

The quality of family planning services will continue to be improved and new effective contraceptives will be widely introduced. Various kinds of high-quality services and information about family-planning and the health care of women and children will be provided to all married couples. Prenatal and postnatal care will be improved. Special attention will be paid to couples in backward areas to ensure their regular acquisition of information about contraception, contraceptive devices and technical services as required;

Family planning should be combined with the health care of women and children; activities will be encouraged to create happy and harmonious families; the implementation of family planning policies must be closely related with activities in improving living standards;

There should be better training of personnel engaged in family planning and health care work so as to improve their efficiency in providing family planning services by increasing their knowledge base and their mastery of new techniques;

Family planning should be closely linked to poverty alleviation efforts in poor regions; poor households that have strictly followed family planning practices should be favoured and rewarded.

7.21 Education and raising levels of competence:

Educational opportunities for women should be increased and improving the conditions for women to be educated should receive particular attention; scientific and technical training should be provided to women of childbearing age, together with information about birth control policies, women should be encouraged to take an active part in social and economic activities and to voluntarily engage in family planning;

Men should be encouraged to share more family responsibilities, particularly, for family planning;

Cultural and educational activities should be further expanded in rural areas, and rural people's educational levels should be raised; traditional concepts about childbearing should be altered to lower birth rates and to avoid endogamous marriages;

Efforts should be made to promote ethical and moral education and to encourage good social ethics; efforts should also be made to gradually educate people in urban and rural areas about environmental protection, improving ecological systems, and the rational use of resources, and to increase public awareness of population issues and the protection of natural resources and the environment.

7.22 Ageing population and development of human resources:

Economic development in local communities should be promoted; the structure of production in rural areas should be improved; guidance should be provided for the development of the township and village enterprises (TVE); there should be active promotion of the development of tertiary industries. Adequate opportunities for employment should be provided to women so they can improve their economic status;

Research should be conducted on how to develop and utilize the ever-increasing labour forces; research should especially consider the inter-relationship between surplus labour in the countryside, the migrant population, the urbanization of the population and the development of TVE enterprises. Measures should be taken to make rational and efficient use of both human and natural resources;

A social security system should be established for elderly people. A well-organized network providing medical care and social services to the elderly in local communities should be further improved. Efforts should be made to put in place a comprehensive social security system in order to better deal with the problems associated with an ageing population.

7.23 Establishment and improvement of overall data collection and information systems:

An information and management system for population statistics and indicators should be established based on computerized data-banks at national, regional and local (counties, towns and villages) levels so that population data and related information can be effectively distributed to guide and improve family planning management and services at grass-root levels. An integrated national decision-making support system (DSS) and an artificial intelligence system will be established gradually;

Techniques for collecting high-quality data will be improved and research on developing technology for objectively evaluating the quality of population data will be conducted. Efforts will be made to train more qualified population management staff;

International cooperation and academic exchanges should be strengthened in order to establish and develop standards for data formatting and software, to ensure that data-banks are compatible with those in information centres found in other countries so that their data can be accessed at both national and regional levels.

7.24 Formulation and evaluation of policies:

Consideration should be given to the demand for natural resources, the generation of wastes and balancing ecological systems, when policies concerning human settlements are being formulated;

In the process of working on environmental protection and economic development, governments at all levels should take into account both the direct and indirect impacts of population fluctuations and evaluate their influence on population characteristics;

When formulating economic policies, due consideration should be given to the impact of an ageing population on labour supply, the demand for resources, family incomes and support capabilities;

There should be policies to guide the migrant population and studies should be made on problems associated with population migration and shifts in labour forces in order to prevent the over-concentration of the population in urban areas and to reduce massive pressures on the environment;

When various policies and programmes resulting from environmental degradation or destruction are being formulated, special attention should be paid to the protection of women and the disabled.

7.25 Regional cooperation and the exchange of experiences:

Experimental zones for pilot projects on coordinating the population and the environment should be established; successful experiences should be publicized and the areas which coordinating the development of the Chinese population and the environment should be gradually enlarged.

There should be long term nationwide monitoring to evaluate the effectiveness of incorporating population policies into national policies, and to determine trends existing in the coordinated development of the population and the environment.

B. Establishment of Sustainable Consumption Patterns Basis for action

7.26 Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, people's consumption patterns have been changing from having the basics towards having a more comfortable life. On the whole, consumption by the Chinese people is still at a low level. Per capita income in China is rather low. According to statistics in the World Bank's development report of 1991, China's GNP in 1989 was US$ 350 per capita (using 1980 exchange rates), thereby placing China in the category of countries with a lower-middle level of annual income.

7.27 Consumption trends in China are not always appropriate and consumption patterns are somewhat lopsided. This is most apparent in the fact that food consumption still dominates, while consumption in recreational and other areas is relatively low; there is a problematic relationship between population growth and diminishing resource availability. On a per capita basis, the availability of natural resources, such as fresh water, farmlands, forests, and mineral resources, is far below the world average. In particular, there is a sharp reduction of non-renewable natural resources, which is severely hindering the sustainable development of the national economy. China is facing growing pressures as people's consumption levels are rising.

7.28 Increases in levels of consumption and adjustments in proportions of expenditure should be based on rational consumption patterns. China will not follow the development model of industrialized countries which have achieved high economic growth and lifestyles through high consumption at the expense of high use of natural resources and serious environmental pollution. China will develop in accordance with her own realities. Appropriate consumption and a low energy-consuming production system should take form in a gradual manner and eventually the Chinese people's standard of living will become rise, based on a more positive and rational approach to consumption.

7.29 By the year 2000, people's lives should be more comfortable. By then, there should be no further per capita increase in consumption of energy and raw materials, and there should be a reduction in the pollution of the environment by hazardous wastes.

7.30 Adjustments in spending patterns and diversification in consumption should be encouraged so that consumption requirements for different living standards will be basically met.

7.31 The principle of payment according to one's work should be practised while taking due consideration of equal opportunity and efficiency. Action should be taken to minimize differences in levels of consumption, to narrow the gap between the rich and poor and to pursue a shared prosperity.

7.32 Productive forces should be developed to establish an efficient system of production involving low energy consumption and less pollution, so that the quantity, quality and diversity of resources for sustaining life can be improved.

7.33 A product structure which appropriately matches rational consumption patterns should be developed in order to:

Expand value-added food processing, increase the production of nutritious and green food so as to raise the quality and nutritional levels of foods;

Develop the production of durable consumer goods and broaden consumption; promote the sale of new consumer goods;

Actively explore the potential in rural markets for durable consumer goods;

Encourage a moderate growth in vehicles for transportation, vigorously develop the construction industry;

Promote development in townships and villages and the commercialization of housing; increase per capita residential space;

Through centralized planning, emphasize improvements in the quality, decoration and convenience of rural housing; work to construct well-laid out and clean new towns, with well-equipped facilities and convenient transportation;

Vigorously encourage the development of tertiary industries so as to make people's lives more comfortable and convenient.

7.34 Reform of the present distribution system should be promoted to solve problems resulting from the unfair distribution of incomes and social resources, and to engender positive attitudes to work. The principle of payment according to one's work should be supplemented by other means of distribution as required, and, consideration should also be given to distribution based on fairness and efficiency. The main points of reform include:

Lifting price controls on agricultural products, agricultural by-products and raw materials, thereby strengthening the market system;

Reforming the financial and taxation systems in order to narrow income gaps between urban and rural areas, between low and high income groups, and between the eastern, central and western regions of China;

Readjusting the distribution of income between central and local governments, between the state and enterprises, and between enterprises and individuals to ensure that the central government has adequate financial resources; rationally combine taxation with the distribution of profits and link income with individual performance in enterprises;

Stabilizing incomes, supplementing basic wages with housing and price subsidies, and guaranteeing adequate basic wages;

Increasing the transparency of personal incomes so that excessively high incomes can be adjusted through taxation.

7.35 The government should guide and promote improvements in individual expenditure patterns, as well as encouraging diversity in spending. It is proposed that:

Tax and other measures be used to control consumption of unhealthy products such as cigarettes and hard liquor and to encourage thrift while discouraging waste;

Rational consumption be promoted by formulating appropriate policies to control spending by government agencies and enterprises;

The structure of enterprises be adjusted to hasten the development of tertiary industries, to increase jobs and individual incomes, to improve living standards of people, and to meet their needs.

C. Actively Developing Social Services and Tertiary Industry Basis for action

7.36 With the opening and reform process and an accelerated pace of economic development, social services and tertiary industries are playing an increasingly important role in people's lives.

7.37 Before 1990, China had 17,413,000 service establishments, 56,000 industrial enterprises within the commercial sector, 117,000 receiving depots for resource reclamation employing 36,390,000 people. There were 170,000 financial institutions, with approximately 2,000,000 staff. Total insured value reached 17.5 billion yuan, covering a wide range of sectors such as industry, agriculture, business, foreign trade, science and technology, culture, education, sports, etc. In the last 10 years, tourism has undergone a rapid development, and 249 tourist attractions and 14 sightseeing routes are now open to world visitors. In 1992, tourism earned US$ 4 billion from 38,116,100 foreign tourists and 330 million domestic tourists. Tourism in China is a relatively mature industry. A comparatively well-developed meteorological service system has been set up across the country. The information industry and consultative services are developing rapidly. At present, the service industry has a variety of economic sectors, traditional businesses have been revived, new businesses are being established at a rapid pace and trans-sectorial groups of enterprises are coming into being one after another. All these are playing important roles in flourishing markets, speeding up the distribution of commodities, improving quality of people's lives, building up the state's financial resources, earning foreign currency and giving fresh impetus to the development of national economy.

7.38 For the time being, tertiary industry in China constitutes a small portion of total GNP, far behind that in developed countries and in many developing countries as well. With the rapid development of the national economy, tertiary industries should also grow. Developing commercial, financial, insurance, tourism, legal, accounting, auditing and social services are fundamental for guaranteeing sustainable development.

7.39 At present, the major problems hindering the development of tertiary industries in China are outmoded ways of thinking, lack of policy guidance, weak management, lack of well-trained service staff and incomplete service networks.

Objectives

7.40 The objectives for development in social services and tertiary industries in China are as follows:

Raising the level of social and specialized services; forming service networks; improving efficiency and quality of services; creating more job opportunities; providing favourable conditions for readjustments in economic structures, for the transformation of enterprises and for restructuring government agencies and institutions; facilitating and enriching people's physical and cultural lives;

Accelerating the development of tertiary industries, and increasing their proportion of GNP.

Activities

7.41 The Decision of the State Council and Central Committee of the Communist Party on Acceleration of Tertiary Industries should be implemented.

7.42 Commercial and commodity circulation sectors should increase their marketing abilities and improve the retail trade system. A wholesale network for industrial and agricultural products and by- products should be established. Efforts should be made to increase capacities for storage and transportation and to accelerate the establishment of a goods distribution network. The construction and operation of environmental protection facilities should be facilitated and noise pollution should be controlled.

7.43 New routes for tourist attractions should be opened up, and tourist resources should be protected to promote pollution-free and environmentally-sound tourism. Tourist-oriented road transportation facilities, airports and related services (including catering establishments) should be constructed. Appropriate ways should be found to solve problems in sewage disposal, refuse collection, goods transportation, waste disposal and to strictly control sources of hazardous pollution at scenic spots,

7.44 Efforts should be made to strengthen management of the catering sector, to enforce laws and regulations with regard to sanitary conditions and food quality, to improve the quality of services, and to encourage healthy, nutritious and pollutant-free green food.

7.45 The exchange of goods in the market should be better organized through establishing a comprehensive distribution network and also establishing a system for managing and regulating the circulation of goods and for ensuring the elimination of counterfeits and inferior products.

7.46 Social insurance should be further developed, and special attention should be paid to the elderly and to disaster insurance. A social security system should be established.

7.47 A financial system, appropriate to the social system and including a sound stock market to promote the development of the financial sector, should be established in China.

7.48 Pollution resulting from the development of tertiary industries should be controlled, particularly in such trades as animal-slaughtering (waste water), storage (pesticides), food processing, catering and manufacturing which emits toxic gases.

7.49 The information industry will be greatly improved through the formulation of favourable policies and regulations; in particular, the process for establishing a basic national geographical information system should be accelerated and an information service system will be created for providing necessary scientific, technological and managerial information to both urban and rural users.

7.50 Legal, accounting, auditing, and other consultation services should be developed.