The Chinese central government is considering stepping up moves
to help the huge number of migrant workers settle in urban areas.
Migrants may soon be able to obtain residence registration in more
than 500 cities nationwide.
Some six out of 10 urban workers in China are from the
countryside, according to a survey made public by the Chinese
Federation of Enterprises over the weekend.
The survey, which included 1,000 companies nationwide, said that
57.6 percent of Chinese workers came from rural areas.
The federation called for more measures to help these migrant
workers live and work with ease in cities. Some officials and
researchers suggested offering schooling for workers' children and
removing barriers such as household registration systems to help
integrate migrant workers into city life.
Lin Yueqin, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social
Sciences, says more efforts should be put into reforming China's
household registration system, enabling migrant workers to reside
in cities and become local residents.
Lin says that migrants should have the right to decide where to
live.
"If they think the cost of living in cities is too high, they
will move back to the villages," he asserts.
Chen Hao, a Ministry of Public Security official, says the
central government is considering implementing a number of measures
to help China's huge number of migrant workers settle in urban
areas. Chen says there is a possibility that migrants will soon be
able to register freely as residents in 80 percent of 660 cities
nationwide. Cities with excessively large populations will not
adopt the measure.
Chen indicates the effort is aimed at reforming the country's
rigid household registration system.
Lin says that since the country started transforming to a market
economy in the late 1970s, increasing numbers of people have left
their hometowns for cities to work or do business.
Problems then emerged as migrants, who totaled some 98 million
as of the end of last year, were denied equal access to work,
education, housing and other social rights enjoyed by locals.
Lin is more concerned about the education of their children, as
millions of rural laborers move to cities for work.
Despite the contributions of migrant families to urban
construction, however, schooling for their children in cities
receives little attention, largely because of the lingering
residency registration system, notes Lin.
(China Daily February 23, 2004)