The State Council has approved reforms initiated by Chongqing
Municipality and city of Chengdu to reduce and finally eliminate
the gap between urban and rural areas.
The two southwestern cities have been given the mandate as
national experimental zones to pilot overall reform of the dual
structure which has long placed rural residents at a
disadvantage.
The message is clear: The widening gap in income, public service
and social security between urban and rural areas must go.
In fact, most of China has long felt the effect of this gap. The
sharp decrease in farmland and the mechanization of farming have
pushed millions of rural residents to find jobs in cities over the
past decades. The total number of migrant workers in big cities
reached more than 900 million at the end of last year.
With rural income five to six times lower than city earnings,
those left behind to farm the land rely on these migrant workers
for cash.
What is deeply worrying is that the urban-rural gap has been
widening in recent years because of the structural barriers
depriving rural residents of equal rights.
The call is growing by both academics and citizens for unified
household registration for rural and urban residents. The action
taken by some local governments to register all households as
residents only, rather than rural or urban, has pioneered the
change of this irrational structure.
The pension systems and other types of social security already
delivered to rural residents in some localities are also helping
close the urban-rural gap.
The underdeveloped southwestern cities designated as
experimental zones are of particular significance as rural
residents make up more than 80 percent of each entity's population
and both cities are involved in the campaign to develop the
west.
Both Chongqing Municipality and Chengdu, capital of Sichuan
Province, have the potential to blaze a new trail in ending
urban-rural polarization.
If successful, their experience will, hopefully, be extended
nationwide.
(China Daily June 11, 2007)