Officials urged to be ‘people of action’
Print Edition
CHINA’S leaders have called for more to be done to facilitate “new-type urbanization,” saying fresh achievements must be made in the area this year.
In an instruction, President Xi Jinping asked authorities to uphold the concepts of innovation, coordination, greenness, openness and sharing in the urbanization process.
Efforts should focus on raising the urbanization rate based on the number of registered urban residents, providing equal public services for rural and urban dwellers, and making cities more people friendly, Xi said.
Although 56.1 percent of China’s population live in cities, only around 40 percent are registered urban residents, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. Most migrant workers have no urban household registration and, as a result, cannot access many public services.
By last year, China had 277.47 million migrant workers, accounting for 20 percent of the population, bureau figures show.
A top-level urban work conference at the end of last year agreed that the urbanization drive should focus on integrating migrant workers into cities. The government plans to ensure 100 million rural migrants have urban household registration by 2020.
Another instruction by Premier Li Keqiang said urbanization is China’s only path to modernization and will provide the country with the biggest domestic demand potential and growth momentum.
Stressing the role of reform and innovation to economic growth, Li also called for further efforts to integrate rural residents into cities.
In a State Council teleconference on urbanization yesterday, Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli said China will fully implement the urban residence permit system so all city residents will have access to basic public services.
Xi also called for improved birth, employment and elderly policies to cope with the country’s aging population.
“Coping with our aging population is crucial for development and hundreds of millions of people’s wellbeing,” Xi said in a written instruction that called for better top-down design based on current situations and future expectations.
Xi said the issue should be high on the agenda and relevant work carried out during the 2016-2020 period.
China has well over 200 million people aged 60 or above, more than 15 percent of the population, and the figure is expected to reach 243 million by 2020. Geriatric care is said to lag far behind demand and varies greatly between regions.
Wang Yong, head of the National Working Commission on Aging, said yesterday: “The focus should be on pressing issues for the elderly, so they feel the benefit.”
Xi also ordered officials at all levels to implement reform measures and address lingering problems to ensure the reform drive is successful. He made the remarks at the 21st meeting of the Central Leading Group for Overall Reform.
Xi, head of the group, said reform concerns all regions and departments.
Officials must play their part as “promoters and people of action,” he said, urging officials to focus on key problems and take precise measures to solve them.
Reform that affects multiple fields or departments calls for diligence, and multiple governmental organs should uphold the principles of “good timing and rhythm,” the meeting was told.
“Those that fail to do so will be held accountable,” a statement said.
Highlighting supervision and evaluation, it stressed that all departments should ensure plans are well documented, and any mistakes or deadline breaches dealt with accordingly. It noted that only truly effective reform will boost social and economic development and give people real benefits.
Good experience and examples should be summarized, so that they can inform other work, the statement said.
Officials were urged to lead by example by arranging and supervising tasks in accordance with the requirements of the central authorities.
Meanwhile, organs at city and county levels were urged to seek public opinion, so the results of reform are in line with people’s expectations.
“Party committees at all levels should ... encourage forward thinking, praise outstanding work, but also tolerate mistakes and failures so all officials actively, voluntarily and creatively participate,” it added.
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