The new semester in March 2006 was different from others for
Shang Zhibo in Manhai Elementary School of Manhai Village in Yunnan Province.
For the first time in his six-year teaching career, he announced
to his fifth-grade class of 16 students that they no longer needed
to pay their 80 yuan (US$10) school fees.
"I was told by the education bureau of Tongxin Township that the
miscellaneous fees are exempted forever and the township government
will always foot the bill from now on," said the 26-year-old
Shang.
"This is really good news for me, for my students, and most
importantly, for their parents."
The average annual income of Manhai villagers in southwest
China's Yunnan Province is 800 yuan (US$100), mainly derived from
vegetables and pigs.
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 high school students
receiving a free education in 2007. By 2008, all the fees for rural
China's 400, 000 elementary and junior high 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.
"This policy is a milestone for China's century-old compulsory
education, moving from an era where farmers support compulsory
education into one where the government shoulders all the
responsibility," said Zhou Ji, China's education minister.
Free and compulsory education is identified as a fundamental
human right by the United Nations. The U.N. Millennium Development
Goals stipulate that every school-age boy and girl complete a full
course of primary education.
A report released by the Asian Development Bank states that of
the world's 190 nations, more than 170 provide their children with
free compulsory education. Included in the list are poor Asian
countries like Laos, Cambodia and Nepal, whose per capita GDP
amounts to just one third of China's.
However 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.
China's literacy has reached 98.9 percent in 2004, with a rate
of 99.2 percent for men and 98.5 percent for women, an increase by
1.2 percent and 5.4 percent for men and women respectively compared
with 1990, according to the UN Millennium Development Goals Report
2005.
Yet 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.
China's compulsory education consists of six years of primary
school and three years of junior high school.
The dream of free compulsory education is far from being
realized. Free education was first mandated in the 1986 Law on
Compulsory Education for China's 289,000 primary schools and 4,266
junior high schools.
By 1998, it still was not free and the number of primary schools
had doubled to handle 140 million students. The number of junior
high schools had jumped 14-fold, handling 50 million students.
County and township governments continued to foot the education
bill in China's vast rural areas. About 78 percent of education
expenses were paid by township and county governments in 2002,
according to a survey by the Development Research Center of the
State Council. Funding from Beijing amounted to less than 2
percent. Poor rural governments passed on some of the expense to
local farmers in "miscellaneous fees".
Of China's 193 million primary and high school students, 70
percent reside in rural areas. To educate a primary school student
averages about 500 yuan (US$62.5) annually, according to an
international analysis based on GDP and government spending on
education. Each junior high school student needs 1,000 yuan
(US$125).
To achieve the goal of a free education for these young people
adds up to about 67.5 billion yuan (US$8.4 billion) per annum.
China's 2 trillion yuan (US$250 billion) national tax revenue would
suggest this figure is now very affordable, according to the
Ministry of Finance.
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.
Shang Zhibo said he was happy to see his students' faces light
up at the news of a free education. "To them, it is more than an
exemption of 80 yuan (US$10). It brings them closer to the goal of
a higher education and a more promising future," he said.
(Xinhua News Agency October 6, 2006)