Report Reveals Progress towards Xiaokang Society

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Thursday, June 12, 2003

Report Reveals Progress towards Xiaokang Society

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The country as a whole still has a long way to go before it reaches the goal of a xiaokang society (one that is comprehensively better-off), in spite of the rapid economic and social improvements in many localities, according to a report released yesterday by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing.

Based on specialized research conducted over the past decade, the report has produced, for the first time, a complete set of standards defining a xiaokang society, which was the goal set by the 16th Congress of the Communist Party of China last year.

The research shows that China has fulfilled 68.7 per cent of these xiaokang tasks by the end of 2001.

According to the report, the country failed to perform well in several major indicators of a better-off society, such as the number of college students in every 10,000 people, the number of phones in every 100 households and the number of computers in every 100 urban households.

But the country did perform well in other aspects. For example, China has fulfilled 94.1 per cent of its goal to have 90 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP) coming from non-agricultural added value.

The report also evaluates the country's 30 mainland provincial regions against the standards, of which Beijing leads the list.

Li Peilin, vice-director of the Institute of Sociology under the academy, who is in charge of the compilation of the report, admitted that the result is a little bit surprising, because "the ranking somehow contradicts people's impressions."

For example, Northeast China's Liaoning Province ranks seventh on the list, ahead of some more economically advanced regions like East China's Fujian and Shandong provinces.

As an explanation, Li said all the data adopted for the report are from the country's official statistics authorities and are analysed on a long-term basis.

"While we are more familiar with Northeast China's depressed State-owned enterprises and high unemployment rate, we cannot ignore the fact that the area, once the traditional industrial base of the country, does boast a higher urbanization rate than many other regions," he said.

As for why Beijing should surpass Shanghai in the list, Li said this has much to do with the higher proportion of wealthy people in the Chinese capital.

The report also suggests the government pay more attention to such issues as family planning, industrial readjustment and urbanization to move steadily towards a xiaokang society.

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