Beijing ticking down to 2008 Olympic Games

                                                                                                                    By Zhan Yan, China Features

 

Beijing is ticking down to the "great event", slated for August 8 to 24, 2008 with the theme of "One world, one dream." According to the organizers, Beijing will build 12 new venues, expand 11 existing ones and set up eight temporary ones for the Olympic Games. All the new venues of the Games will be completed before the end of 2007. Bird's Nest, the signature building for the Beijing Olympics, is beginning to take shape after it broke ground in December 2005 and will cover a space of 258,000 square meters with 91,000 seats. It is the nickname of the futuristic National Stadium for its nest-like steel-boned exterior.

  Automobiles topped 2.3 million in Beijing by the end of 2005. Given the current growth rate, the number could rise to 3.5 million in 2008. In order to ensure smooth transportation during the Olympic Games, Beijing has published and implemented a "transportation strategic plan" for the 2008 Olympics. Specifically speaking, the city is upgrading its underground transport network to relieve the pressure on road transport.  The government has been replacing the old fleet of more than 18,000 buses in Beijing in the hope that more comfortable buses will produce more bus-takers. Beijing will dispatch 4,000 vehicles for people with tickets of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games to take free ride of buses, subway and light railway during the Games.

  Other matters such as food, water and security have also been seriously considered. Beijing is carefully planning food services for both the competitors and spectators.  Water safety is also highlighted since Beijing is located in the drought-prone northern China. Security is upgraded with Beijing's planning to deploy 20,000 policemen for the Games, along with 10,000 professional security staff.

 

China's Surging Foreign Trade: Joy Tempered with Sorrow

 

                                                                                                                        By Wu Qi, China Features

 

China's foreign trade has surged at an average annual rate of more than 30 percent over the past five years since its accession to the World Trade Organization in 2001. From 2001 to 2005, China doubled the total value of its imports and exports as China's share of gross world trade rose from 4 percent to 6.7 percent.

 

China's trade surplus with the US was $80 billion in 2004 and exceeded $110 billion in 2005, according to official statistics. With a growing trade surplus, China is under pressure from the United States to raise the exchange rate of the yuan: many American economists attributed their country's increasing trade deficit to the RMB's fixed peg. In July 2005, China abandoned the yuan peg to dollar, and raised the value of the RMB by 2 percent to 8.11 per US dollar. The RMB exchange rate had fluctuated around 8 yuan per dollar over the past year.

 

But the trade imbalance between China and the United States cannot be solved by relying solely on appreciation of the Chinese currency. It is triggered by the country's previous policy of encouraging exports and restricting imports. It is also created by multinationals as they eye low labor costs in the country and choose to produce their labor-intensive products in China. A high proportion of export profits in fact stay in the pockets of multinationals.

 

China, realizing the problem, has restructured the export mix: increasing export tariffs and lowering export rebates in 2005. Actually, China's foreign trade structure has evolved through three phases: In the 1980s, China mainly exported light industrial products, textiles and apparels. In the 1990s, China mainly exported electrical appliances and machinery, of a higher technological content. Since its WTO accession in 2001, China has boosted its exports of new and high-tech products based in the IT industry.

 

To promote sustained development of the domestic economy, China is set to adjust its foreign trade and investment policies. China will gradually integrate corporate taxes paid by domestic and foreign companies, said Vice Finance Minister Li Yong.

 

To increase the technical content and added value of export products, the Ministry of Commerce has decided to establish a foreign trade development fund this year, to support Chinese companies' research and development and independent innovation.

 

China has tried hard to balance foreign trade, but "by no means will the adjustment harm people's enthusiasm in using foreign capital and developing foreign trade," said Fu Ziying.

 

                                                                                                 From Thirsty to Thrifty: China's Battle for Sustainability

By Yang Jianxiang, China Features

 

Energy supply is a mounting problem for China.

China might be a vast land with vast resources, but the country also has a vast population of 1.3 billion. China's total reserve of resources ranks 3rd in the world, but the per capita figure is 53^rd.

 

Of the 45 minerals of strategic importance, say experts, nine will enter seriously shortage by 2020 and 10 short supply. China's proven exploitable oil reserves can only last another 14 years at the current speed of extraction. A little frugality can make a big difference, especially in regions where China's utilization of resources is extravagant.

Efficiency of resource exploitation in China is fairly low. The gross recovery rate of minerals, about 30 percent, is 20 percentage points lower than abroad. Energy-saving housing in China accounted for only 3.5 percent of urban residential construction. The country's energy use for heating is two to three times higher than developed countries in similar climactic conditions.

In June 2004, the general office of the State Council launched a nationwide campaign for resource conservation. In his Government Work Report delivered in early March, Premier Wen Jiabao put forward six points for economizing on use of resources in an effort to quicken construction of an environmental-friendly society.

A growing consensus among officials, entrepreneurs and scholars is that the establishment of institutional mechanisms is necessary for these efforts to have a long-term effect or any effect at all.

China needs to establish proper mechanisms to ensure projects improve their standards in the use of resources. Backward technology, products and equipment must be eliminated, and high-energy consuming products, such as motor vehicles, must meet strict standards before being allowed on the market.

On many occasions, the Chinese government has expressed support for developing new technologies, especially those that save resources or are related to renewable energies. Incentives in the areas of budget allocation, tax collection and price setting are being renewed or introduced to encourage such development.

Compulsory technical standards are expected to regulate economic development to achieve savings. In this regard, China needs to work out more specific energy efficiency standards for key industries and products, especially for buildings and automobiles.

If the motor vehicles on China's roads could match global standards of petrol efficiency and transportation optimized, according to one estimate, China's transport sector alone could save 87 million tons of crude oil by 2020: almost half the country's crude output.

 

                                                                        China Steps up IPR Protection to Promote Innovation

                                                                                           By Ding Yimin, China Features

 

Landlords of Beijing's biggest retail markets including the Silk Alley Market signed a memorandum with a group of international manufacturers of brand-name products in early June, 2006.

 

The memo represented just one of China's recent measures to step up intellectual property right (IPR) protection, amidst the leaders' call for building up a nation of innovation. In 1982, China issued the Trademark Law. Then in 1984 and in 1990, the Patent Law and Copyright Law were also issued one after another.

 

Statistics from the Supreme Court show that in 2005, local courts at all levels received 3,567 criminal cases and 16,583 civil cases of IPR violation, up 28.36% and 20.66% respectively over 2004.

 

Chinese government has realized the importance of IPR protection in the process of building up a nation of innovation and concrete measures have been implemented. The State Administration for Industry and Commerce issued a circular in February demanding rectification of the wholesale and retail markets in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangdong and Zhejiang provinces to clamp down on fake goods. China is also implementing a range of IPR steps to pre-install software programs. China has increased its financial support to IPR-related work. The State Council, or the central government, has decided to hold regular meetings to deal with IPR-related issues, and the National People's Congress, the top legislature, has put implementation of patent law at top of the agenda for its law enforcement inspection work.

 

However, many problems on IPR-related issues still remain to be solved. Statistics with the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPC) show that only 2,000-plus Chinese enterprises, or every three out of 10,000 enterprises, have proprietary IPRs. Some Chinese enterprises are highly dependent on foreign-patented technologies. To address this problem, China is trying to encourage enterprises, research institutes and universities to produce patented technologies and products. China aims at ranking fifth in the world in terms of the domestically-produced invention patents by 2020.

 

The Chinese government's inadequate punishment for IPR violation looms as another problem in IPR protection. The price IPR violators have to pay is still low in China, making it of poor deterrent value.

 

Chinese public awareness of IPR protection needs improving. China will set up claim centers in 50 cities this year to handle domestic complaints on the infringement of intellectual property rights, according to the Ministry of Commerce. 

 

                                                           China Strives for Free Compulsory Education for All

 

                                                            By Rong Jiaojiao, China Features

At the end of 2005, the Chinese government announced it would invest 125.4 billion yuan (US$15.6 billion) over the next five years to foot the bill for compulsory education in rural areas, making sure every rural child has the opportunity for a free nine-year education.

 

Beijing invested 3.69 billion yuan (US$461.3 million) on schools in 12 western provinces including Yunnan and Sichuan to cover the school fees before the start of 2006 spring semester.

    The plan is to extend the scheme to China's central and eastern areas, with 148 million primary and junior school students receiving a free education in 2007. By 2008, all the fees for rural China's 400, 000 elementary and junior schools will be shouldered by central and local governments. Local governments have been ordered to pay a minimum 92.8 billion yuan (US$11.6 billion) over the next five years, bringing the total spending to a potential 212.8 billion yuan (US$26.6 billion).

In addition, students from poor farming families in key counties included in the national poverty alleviation plan will be provided with free textbooks and exempted from paying miscellaneous fees. Boarding students will receive a living allowance.

In China, children in poor rural areas often miss out on compulsory education due to the inability of local governments to fund public schooling and the massive income gap between eastern urban and western rural areas. 87 million people in China remain illiterate, 23 million of whom are youths and middle-aged individuals, according to the Ministry of Education's National Report on Education for All released in November 2005. About eight percent of the nation has not yet adopted the nine-year compulsory education system, and all of these areas are in the poorer and more remote western regions.

A draft amendment to China's Law on Compulsory Education aiming to ensure stable funding for rural education was tabled to lawmakers at the annual National People's Congress session in March 2006. The amendment, which outlines the responsibilities of central and local governments in financing rural schools, is on the way to be finalized.

 

China battles pollution amid full-speed economic growth

                                                     By Miao Hong / China Features

 

By June 20, 2006, SEPA had received 78 pollution reports involving 25 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities, among which, 37 were caused by industrial accidents and 17 by traffic accidents, accounting for 47 percent and 17 percent of the total respectively.

 

The frequent occurrence of environmental incidents has sounded alarm for the world's largest developing country. In the 26 years from 1979 to 2005, China's GDP increased from 406.26 billion yuan (49.08 billion U.S. dollars) to 18.2321 trillion yuan (2.2 trillion U.S. dollars), with an average annual growth rate of 9.6%, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

 

But recently SEPA warned that the economic losses caused by environmental pollution might account for about 10 percent of China's GDP. The excessive exploitation of natural resources, environmental deterioration and ecological destruction, along with the continued growth of an already-1.3-billion population, are hindering the country's sustainable development.

 

The major pollution of Northeast China's Songhua River in late 2005 was considered to be one of the worst of river pollution since the founding of New China in 1949. It resulted from a blast at an upstream state-owned petrochemical plant in November, 2005 in Jilin City of Jilin Province and has taught China a bitter lesson.

 

On the other hand, the Songhua River pollution incident has also become a turning point in SEPA's history of environmental law enforcement. After the accident, SEPA launched a comprehensive review of chemical and petrochemical projects near major water areas. A total of 180,000 environmental law enforcement workers throughout the country were mobilized to carefully examine 49,000 major enterprises. Environmental officials inspected the potential risks of 127 key chemical and petrochemical projects under construction with a total investment of 450 billion yuan (54.37 billion U.S. dollars). These projects are located near environmentally-sensitive areas like the shores of rivers, lakes, oceans, densely-populated regions and nature reserves.

 

During China's 11^th Five-Year Development Program period (2006-2010), environmental supervisory forces nationwide will expand to 80,000, while the equipment for environmental law enforcement will also be upgraded. Recently, SEPA has decided to set up five regional supervision centers of environmental protection, which lie in the east, south, northwest, southwest and northeast with a total of 160 staff members, in an effort to get rid of the interference of the local governments while exercising its authority in environmental supervision, management and protection.

 

                                                                                                                 New Countryside, New Rural Life

                                                                                                                   

                                                                                                                    By Wen Chihua, China Features

 

Although China is traditionally an agricultural power with more than half of the population still farming, industrialization and urbanization have overshadowed other sectors on the government agenda in the past decades. As a result, observes Prof. Wen, rural China has not kept pace with the development of urban areas.

 

The new countryside plan indicates that the government is to pay equal, if not more, attention to the countryside as to the cities, and is to revitalize rural China through science and technology.

 

The official criteria for the new countryside, in Premier Wen's words, are "enhanced productive forces, higher living standards, civilized living style, an orderly and clean environment, and democratic administration." 

 

That reform of 27 years ago resulted in two significant changes in farmers' lives: increase in their incomes and growth in their purchasing power. That in turn led to township enterprises emerging as a new force where state companies failed to meet demand. But only a small part of the rural communities, mainly in the east, sustained the momentum of development and remained affluent, experts say. The vast bulk of countryside had remained stagnant as urban expansion soared during the 1990s.

 

The central government has decided to spend 339.7 billion yuan on farmers this year, an increase of 14.2 percent on last year. Most of the money will be allocated to bettering rural schools, improving access to health care and public works like road construction and irrigation works.  

 

But while the increased spending must be welcomed, it's important to remember the base is low. Rural development forms 8.9 percent of China's entire budget, says Prof. Pan Wei of Beijing University. "It's a drop in the ocean. That is to say the new spending only amounts to an additional seven dollars per head a year."

 

Building a new socialist countryside in the final analysis is all about building new cities in rural areas, or so believes the CCTV pundit Song Xiaojun. "The idea of a new countryside is about hope, materially and culturally. People mostly live on hope or expectation."

 

China Strives to Narrow Yawning Income Gap for Social Equality

                                                                   By Rong Jiaojiao, China Features

 

China has been experiencing rapid transitions since Deng Xiaoping launched reforms in 1978 to turn a planned economy into a market-oriented one and an agricultural society into an urban, industrialized one. However, the "letting a few people and regions get rich first" policy seemed to have so far failed to result in the originally-designed "common prosperity", while a growing income gulf is emerging between urban and rural residents, between different regions, and even between urban residents employed in different sectors. China has become home to the rich dads and poor dads, luxury villas and migrant shacks.

Chinese authorities have put the establishment of a more fair and equal income distribution system compatible with a market economy on top of its agenda, so as to guarantee equal competition for all of society.

    Starting July 1, 2006, the central government plans to spend 34.7 billion yuan (US$4.3 billion) on increasing the income of the low-paid and expanding the size of the middle class while wiping out illegitimate incomes and putting a curb on excessively high salaries.

A total of 120 million people, including six million central and local government officials, 30 million employees from public institutions, 50 million retired veterans and government employees, are expected to benefit from the pay rise. In addition, the stipend standards for 30 million disabled army servicemen, family members of martyrs of the communist revolution and servicemen, and the basic subsistence allowances for urban dwellers will also be raised.

Yang Yiyong, deputy director of the Economic Research Institute of the National Development Reform Commission, holds that to form a sound income distribution system will take time. "A country cannot avoid seeing widening income disparity during its early stages of shifting to a market economy given the difference in a person's ability, family conditions and place of birth," he said.

However, "the inequalities caused by social policies, resulting in people's unequal opportunities in receiving education, health insurance, and chances of migration, without doubt, should be avoided. Otherwise, it will lead to high unemployment, social unrest and imbalanced investment and consumption."

In 2006, a "new socialist countryside" program was unveiled by the Chinese authorities, which focuses on providing increased support for farmers together with improved education and health care for the rural population. China will spend an extra 5.2 billion yuan (US$650 million) on rural schools, hospitals, crop subsidies and other programs, raising spending on those areas by 15 percent, Premier Wen Jiabao told the annual legislative session of the National People's Congress earlier this year.