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No Resettlement Project for Development of China's West
Chinese official said on June 10 that there is no large-sized resettlement project for the greater development of west China region.
Li Shantong, Director of Regional Development Department of the Development Research Center of the State Council, said that some overseas media incorrectly reported that China will open up the western region by huge resettlement project.
Some articles carried by overseas media claimed that China's west will become a "container" for the increased population of the country and in the coming years, the west is expected to hold about 300 million people from the east.
"As far as I know, the central government does not have such a project. At present, the principal task for the development of China's west is to improve ecological environment and the population quality," Li said.
Attending the Chongqing International Symposium on Development of China's West, Li said unlike the development of the west part of the United States, China's west is not a virgin land. There are some population structure and central cities with stronger radiation capacity in west China region.
He noted that comparing with the east, labor force in the west are not deficient.
There are 10 provinces, autonomous regions and municipality in China's west. The area and the population of the west accounts for 57 and 23 percent of the country's total respectively.
"Large-sized resettlement to the west will aggravate the ecological environment and it is not a good way to follow," he said.
Cai Fang, Director of the Institute of Population Science of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that in recent period the population structure in the west will remain unchanged. The population floating between the east and west will abide by law of market economy.
He said that in the west which is economically and culturally backward, labor force is surplus and high level talents are deficient comparatively. Thus, China's west is now continuing to transfer laborers to the east.
But, he said, the commercial opportunities promoted by the development of China's west will absorb high-quality talents and mature technical workers.
To ensure the success of the greater development of the west China region, Chinese government and local governments in the east have formulated a series policies to encourage talents to take part in the development in the west.
According to the policies, the talented people can retain all their relations in their original places in the east and they can return to east at any time. The west region is also allow the people to come and go freely.
Cai said the state stressed the importance to improve the quality of the population in the west, for development of west mainly depends on themselves.
It is learned that the Ministry of Education has decided to promote development of education in the west, especially in the regions with ethnic population.
The universities and colleges in the eastern and central part of China will expand enrollment to the students from the west and they are encouraged to run well classes for students from Tibet and Xinjiang and for other ethnic people.
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