China utilizes population data to improve social assistance

BEIJING, July 11 (Xinhua) -- An unemployed leukemia patient surnamed Huang in Liuzhou, southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, was relieved to hear that the local government had granted her medical assistance and other temporary help.

Rather than seeking social assistance on her own, Huang was instead contacted by local civil affairs authorities after they reviewed a list of patients with excessive medical expenses.

According to the Liuzhou Big Data Development Bureau, the city has integrated data shared by multiple departments, such as medical insurance, rural revitalization and human resources, to establish an early warning system for low-income people in need of assistance.

Wang Xiaohui, an official with the bureau, said the move had "greatly improved the efficiency of government service compared to the traditional way of locating these people through manual processing of relevant information."

Liuzhou and a number of other cities around China responded to the central government's October 2023 demand to strengthen the dynamic monitoring of the low-income population and improve the tiered and classified social assistance system.

The central government guideline categorizes low-income people in need of assistance into different tiers based on their degree of difficulty and the assistance includes support for basic livelihood, medical care, education, housing, employment, disaster relief and emergency support.

Tang Chengpei, vice minister of civil affairs, said that in addition to channels that encourage low-income families to apply for social assistance, China should leverage big data shared across different departments and dispatch more grassroots workers to households to identify those in need.

China's efforts are consistent with the theme of this year's World Population Day, observed annually on July 11. "To Leave No One Behind, Count Everyone" highlights an important but often neglected feature of population censuses: the inclusive and thorough data collection process.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that now is the time to consider who remains uncounted and why. He urged everyone to commit to doing more to ensure that the data systems capture the full range of human diversity so that "everyone is seen, can exercise their human rights, and can reach their full potential."

"As the theme of this year's World Population Day reminds us, investing in data collection is important to understanding problems, tailoring solutions, and driving progress," Guterres said.

Jiang Wei, director of the social assistance department of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, said local authorities across China have made progress in identifying low-income populations and developing a platform for dynamic monitoring of the group.

The tiered and classified platform aggregates information from different systems, including social assistance, household financial situations, and assistance for individuals in urgent need, covering the whole country with regular updates, Jiang said.

The number of low-income population being monitored on the information platform topped 80 million in March of this year, accounting for 5.7 percent of China's total population, according to the ministry.

"Those under monitoring do not necessarily need assistance," said Jiang. "The purpose of monitoring is to detect risks at an early stage and sound alarms."

Over the years, China has also compared school roll information with population data on a regular basis to detect dropout students, particularly around the start of each new semester, according to the Ministry of Education (MOE).

Ma Jiabin, director of the MOE's Department of Basic Education, said China has built a nationwide assistance network covering poor students of different age groups to ensure that no one drops out of school due to financial difficulties.

Statistics showed 161 million students received financial assistance in 2022 totaling 292.27 billion yuan (about 41 billion U.S. dollars).

Yang Lixiong, a professor of social security studies at Renmin University of China, said these measures help guarantee public living standards in China and consolidate the country's hard-won poverty alleviation results while laying the foundation for the drive to achieve common prosperity for all.