In 2000, the Chinese
government made new efforts and achieved new progress in the
protection of workers' economic, social and cultural rights.
The government promulgated and
implemented the Regulations on the Administration of the
Labor Market in accordance with the Labor Law in 2000,
providing a guarantee for workers' right to employment from
the angle of standardizing the labor market. According to
statistics, by the end of 2000, employees in China totaled
more than 710 million, an increase of 5.64 million over the
figure for the previous year, including over 210 million
employees in cities and towns, an increase of 2.6 million.
Last year, 3.61 million workers laid off by state-owned
enterprises found new jobs through various channels. The
registered urban unemployment rate was 3.1 percent by the
end of 2000. To better solve the employment of rural labor,
the Chinese government has carried out a three-year program
for the overall planning of urban and rural employment since
2000, retraining rural workers, promoting the development
and employment of the rural labor force in the western
region, and encouraging and supporting migrant laborers to
return to their home villages to start businesses.
China has worked hard to
develop job training with a view to enhancing workers' job
skills and quality and improving their capabilities of
finding employment and adapting to job changes. In 2000, the
Chinese government formulated the Regulations on Employing
Skilled Workers and the Procedures for Implementation of the
Training of Labor Reserves. According to statistics, there
were 4,098 secondary technical training schools nationwide
with an enrollment of over 1.5 million in 2000; more than
3,000 training centers, with an annual admission to 4.08
million; and 16,000 training centers run by social sectors,
with an annual admission to 3.6 million. A total of 4.5
million jobless persons and laid- off workers received new
skill training, 300,000 people received guidance for and
training in starting businesses, and 750,000 junior and
senior middle school graduates in urban areas who failed to
continue further studies received training under the "
training of labor reserves" program. In 2000, 4.25
million students were admitted to various secondary
vocational and technical schools, bringing the enrollment of
such schools to the grand total of 12.95 million; and 96.42
million people received training at the adult technical
training schools. To date, approximately 30 million people
have obtained professional credentials in China.
The state guarantees the
workers' right to obtain payment for labor, and their wages
have been on the increase. In 2000, the government
formulated the Guidelines on Further Deepening the Reform of
the Internal Distribution System of Enterprises and the
Trial Measures on Settling Wages Through Collective
Negotiations, to strengthen the guidance for the
wage-related work of enterprises. In 1999, the wages of
workers in cities and towns totaled 987.55 billion yuan, an
increase of 6.2 percent over the figure for the previous
year; and their per capita wage was 8,346 yuan, an increase
of 11.6 percent over the previous year, and a 13. 1 percent
growth in real terms, allowing for price fluctuations. By
the end of 2000, all the provinces, autonomous regions and
municipalities, except Tibet, had established and improved a
minimum-wage guarantee system, readjusted and issued the
standards for minimum wages in their own areas.
To safeguard the social
security rights of workers, China has preliminarily
established a social insurance system, mainly covering basic
pension insurance, basic medical insurance and unemployment
insurance for workers in cities and towns. It had enhanced
the level of the basic livelihood guarantee of workers laid
off by state-owned enterprises, the level of unemployment
insurance, and the level of ensuring a minimum standard of
living for urban residents. By the end of 2000, the system
for ensuring a minimum standard of living for urban
residents had been established in all cities and towns where
the people's governments at the county level are located,
benefiting 3.818 million urban residents; 15 provinces,
autonomous regions and municipalities had established such a
system for rural residents, benefiting three million
villagers with a total of 730 million yuan. In 2000, the
cost of social insurance increased substantially in the
state financial expenditure, and the social security costs,
such as old- age pension, unemployment insurance, the basic
livelihood guarantee for laid-off workers, and the
minimum-standard-of-living guarantee for urban residents
arranged by the central budget reached 47.8 billion yuan, an
increase of 86 percent over 1999. By the end of 2000, a
total of 104.08 million workers in China had participated in
the unemployment insurance program, with a monthly average
of 1.88 million receiving unemployment insurance; 104.47
million workers and 31.7 million retirees had participated
in the basic pension insurance program; 43 million workers
had participated in the basic medical insurance program;
over 2,000 counties and cities had established the system of
insurance against injuries at work, covering 42 million
workers; 27 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities
had tried out childbirth insurance, and 1,412 counties and
cities introduced the childbirth insurance mutual assistance
program, in which approximately 30 million workers
participated.
China has
increased its investment in education to create favorable
conditions for citizens to exercise their right to receive
education. During the Ninth Five-Year Plan period, the
education fund increased at a rate of 15.56 percent annually
on average, which was higher than the growth speed of the
national economy. The proportion of the national financial
education fund in the GDP increased continuously, rising
from 2.41 percent in 1995 to 2.79 percent in 1999. The
nation's total education fund in 1999 was 1.8 times that of
1995. The central and local governments raised an
11.6-billion-yuan special education fund for 852 poverty-
stricken counties following the introduction of the
"project for compulsory education in poverty-stricken
areas." The state formulated the Regulations on the
Administration of State Loans for Students (for trial
implementation) and the Regulations on the Operation of the
Industrial and Commercial Bank of China State Loans for
Students (for trial implementation), so as to
comprehensively institute the student loan system to
guarantee students with financial difficulties the right to
receive education. By the end of 2000, China had virtually
made nine-year compulsory education universal, covering 85
percent of the population, and basically wiped out
illiteracy among the young and adults, reducing the rate of
young and adult illiterates to less than five percent.
Statistics show that there were 22.44 million children in
kindergartens in China in 2000; over 130 million pupils in
primary schools, the attendance rate of school-age children
reaching 99.1 percent; 62.56 million students in junior
middle schools, the gross attendance rate reaching 88.6
percent; 12.01 million students in 14,600 senior middle
schools; 5.56 million students in 1,041 institutions of
higher learning; 3.54 million students in 772 adult
institutions of higher learning; 301, 000 students in 738
institutions for training postgraduates; and 378,000
students in special education schools.
Cultural undertakings have
developed rapidly, and the people's cultural life has become
increasingly rich and colorful. By the end of 2000, China
had 2,622 performing art troupes; 2,911 cultural centers;
2,769 public libraries; 1,373 museums; 3,816 archive
establishments; national and provincial newspapers with a
circulation of 20.3 billion copies, magazines with a
circulation of 2.85 billion copies, and books with a
circulation of 6.35 billion copies; 732 medium- and
short-wave broadcasting transmitting and relay stations,
covering 92.1 percent of the population; and 1,313 TV
transmitting and relay stations each with more than 1,000
watts, covering 93.4 percent of the population. China has
79.2 million users of cable television, ranking first in the
world.
Telecommunications have
advanced by leaps and bounds. The second-biggest
three-dimensional communications network in the world
linking the whole country and the rest of the world has been
established, and the number of telephone subscribers ranks
second in the world. By the end of 2000, there were 230
million telephone subscribers nationwide, including 85.26
million subscribers of mobile phones, second only to the
United States; for every 100 urban residents there are 39
telephones on average, and telephone service covers 80
percent of the administrative villages. Digital and
multi-media communications networks now cover all
prefectures and cities, and some counties. Automatic roaming
through the networks of the China Mobile Communications
Corporation and the China Unicom reaches 84 countries and
regions. The users of the Internet have risen from 10,000 in
1994, when China joined the Internet network, to well over
22.5 million. There are more than 27,300 websites in China
at present.
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