China shut down over 5,000 township enterprises and rural
self-employed businesses since August last year in a bid to protect
peasant workers from occupational diseases.?
Nearly 3,000 others were ordered to suspend operation for
overhaul, said Su Zhi, deputy director of the Law Enforcement and
Supervision Department under China's Ministry of Health, at a press
briefing in Beijing Friday.
China's township enterprises are an important sector that helps
provide job opportunities for the country's superfluous labor
forces in rural areas.
Statistics show that China has about 480 million rural laborers
and by the end of 2003, nearly 135 million were transferred from
farming to working in township enterprises.
However, as some local governments cared too much about economic
growth and neglected the poor working conditions of certain
township enterprises, employees frequently suffered risks of
contracting occupational diseases, Su said.
To detect the potential risks for occupational diseases, nine
Chinese departments, including the Health Ministry, the Ministry of
Agriculture and the Ministry of Public Security, carried out a
massive overhaul from August 2003 to March 2004, with special focus
on the township enterprises and rural self-employed businesses.
The result revealed that about 57.5 percent of all the
enterprises that have been inspected and tested failed to meet
relevant standards, Su said.
Su said the nationwide inspection revealed a relatively clearer
picture of the occupational diseases in China and a cooperative
working mechanism among the nine departments has started taking
form.
The key point is that the departments should improve cooperation
and coordination and jointly explore a long-term effective working
mechanism in order to protect the health of peasant workers, Su
said.
(Xinhua News Agency May 15, 2004)