Get documents about "ye_en
Document Sample
The Sustainable Development of the China’s Urban Areas
and Its Outlook
Ye Yumin, Professor and Director of the Department of Urban Planning and
Management, Renmin University
For the past quarter of a century, China has been undergoing the process of
urbanization, which is recognized worldwide for having the following features: the
largest in scale, the most complex in background, having the largest number of
beneficiaries, reaping the most remarkable achievement, yet facing most difficulties
and challenges. From 1978 to 2006, the total urban population in China grows from
172.45 million to 577.06 million, meaning an increase of 404.61 million people,
which equals to 87% of the total population in the European Union in 2005.
Meanwhile, the number of cities grows from 192 to 661. It is expected that the
urbanization process will gain further momentum of development in the next two
decades, and by then, the urbanization rate will grow to about 60%; the number of
cities will grow to about 1500, and cities and towns will see a further increase of
around 300 million people in their population. Such an urbanization process has not
only created immeasurable wealth for China, but also for the rest of the world. In
fact, it is an important driving force for the development and prosperity of China and
world at large. Therefore, it is fair to say that urbanization is one of the key themes
for the development of China, as it is closely related to the future of China.
However, a series of environmental problems and other unprecedented challenges
have been emerging in the midst of this urbanization process, such as deforestation,
desertification of grasslands, fragility of ecological environment, more serious urban
pollution, and increasing social conflicts (caused by the rigidity of urban-rural dual
structure, as well as the widening gap between the urban rich and poor), to name just
a few. Faced with these challenges, the Chinese government has taken proactive
measures, and as a result, some of these problems have already been solved or have
witnessed some improvement; yet some other problems keep deteriorating.
This report presents the readers with the picture of China’s urbanization process and
its outlook, and reveals the major environmental issues emerging from this process as
well as its causes. The author hopes to share thoughts and exchange views on the
feasible path of sustainable development in China.
1
1. The Urbanization Process and Urban Development in China as well as Their
Outlooks
1.1 The Development of Urbanization in China and Its Stages
For half a century or so, in particular ever since the reform and opening up at the end
of 1970s, the urbanization process in China has witnessed remarkable achievement
that is widely recognized worldwide. From 1978 to 2006, the urban population in
China increases from 172 million to 578 million, with an average increase of 14.5
million people per year; meanwhile the urbanization rate grows from 17.9% to
43.9%, with an average growth rate of 0.929 percentage point. This also means that
China has the largest (in terms of scale) and longest (in terms of the duration that
high-speed development lasts) urbanization process in the world. Please see Chart
One below, which demonstrates the changes of urban and rural population as well as
the urbanization rate during 1952 to 2006.
Chart One: changes of urban, rural population and the urbanization rate
From 1952 to 2006
Notes: 1. Left in the vertical direction: the number unit is ten thousand people.
2. Bottom in the horizontal direction, from left to right: urban population (unit: ten
thousand people), rural population (unit: ten thousand people), and urbanization rate (%).
Since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the development of
urbanization in China has undergone three major stages: From 1949 to 1978, the
urbanization in China moved forward ponderously, and even went through a
stagnation period; from 1979 to 1995, urbanization started to run on a sound track
for development, demonstrated by the fact that urban population outgrew rural
population by a large margin; and ever since 1996, rural population has seen
decrease in its absolute volume, meaning that China’s urbanization marches into its
key middle stage of rapid development, and shows potentials for further momentum
of growth in the next two or three decades to come; and the third stage will not come
to an end until China becomes an urbanized country of elementary level. Table One
2
below lists some of the key indicators of China’s urbanization as well as their
development in each stage from 1952 to 2006.
Table One The Changes of Urban, Rural Population and the Urbanization
Rate from 1952 to 2006
Average Increase (or Decrease) in
Total Population Per Year (Unit: ten
Population thousand people)
The Growth
Coefficient
(Unit: ten Total (K) of the
thousand Urbanization Population Urban Rural Urban
people） Rate (%) Nationwide Population Population Population
1952 57482 12.5
1960 66207 19.7 1090.6 738.8 351.9 0.68
1970 82992 17.4 1678.5 135.1 1543.4 0.08
1978 96259 17.9 1658.4 352.6 1305.8 0.21
1980 98705 19.4 1223.0 947.5 275.5 0.77
1985 105851 23.7 1429.2 1190.8 238.4 0.83
1990 114333 26.4 1696.4 1020.2 676.2 0.60
1995 121121 29.0 1357.6 995.8 361.8 0.73
2000 126742 36.2 1124.2 2146.2 -1022.0 1.91
2005 130756 43.0 802.8 2061.4 -1258.6 2.51
2006 131448 43.9 692.0 1494.0 -802.0 2.16
1952-1978 1491.4 387.8 1103.7 0.26
1979-1995 1462.5 1054.6 407.8 0.72
1996-2006 938.8 2048.4 -1109.5 2.18
（
Notes: 1） Sources：China Statistical Yearbook 2006, Issued by National Bureau of Statistics, Published by China
Statistics Publishing House, Beijing, 2007; China Statistical Abstract 2006, Issued by National Bureau of Statistics,
Published by China Statistics Publishing House, Beijing, 2007.
（2）The growth coefficient of urban population refers to the proportion that urban population growth
covers in the total population growth, and we show it as “k” here; k is an important indicator to distinguish the five
stages of urbanization. Stage 1: K＜0.5, pre-urbanization stage. K＜0.5 means the growth of urban population is
smaller than the growth of rural population, and this stage can be interpreted as the low-level urbanization stage
the
with ponderous urbanization development. Stage 2: 0.5≤K＜1， early stage of urbanization. K≥0.5 means that
urban population continuously outgrows rural population, and this signifies that urbanization has started to be on
the track for rapid development. Stage 3: K≥1, the middle stage of urbanization. K≥1 means the growth of total
population fully comes from the growth of urban population, and the absolute volume of the rural population has
turned from increase to decrease; this phenomenon can be regarded as the beginning of rural-urban integration.
Stage 4: urban population/ total population≥50%, urbanized society of elementary level. The proportion of urban
population in the total is equal to or higher than 50% shows: the urban population has surpassed the rural
population in terms of absolute volume, and this also means a country has already come into being an urbanized
society of elementary level. Stage 5: urban population/ total population≥65%, maturely urbanized society.
3
Since 1996, China has entered into the middle stage of urbanization in a steady
manner, marked by the fact that the growth coefficient of urban population has
surpassed1, while the average growth coefficient of urban population reaches 2.18.
Actually, the fact that the growth coefficient of urban population is larger than 1
shows: the absolute volume of rural population starts to decrease, indicating the
conflicts between huge rural population and limited farmland resources start to be
alleviated, and the scale of agricultural activities has started to expand in the real
sense. With the expansion of agricultural activities scale as well as the advancement
of agricultural technology, the efficiency of agricultural sector has improved
tremendously, and its gap with the efficiency of non-agricultural sector has been
narrowed down as a result. Meanwhile, the income of the rural residents begins to
increase substantially, thus, the gap between rural and urban incomes are narrowed;
this has helped put in place one of the basics for rural-urban integration process,
which is currently under promotion by the Chinese central government. All these
indicators tell that urbanization in China is well prepared for the entrance into a new
stage.
1.2 The Main Features of Urban Economic Development in China and the
Differences among Regional Economic Development
1.2.1. Urban development is the key driver for the growth of Chinese economy.
Between 1979 and 2006, China’s GDP grows at an average 9.8% per year, which
represents the fastest average annual GDP growth in the world; at the same time, 27
years of rapid GDP growth also demonstrates the most long-lasting high-speed
economic growth in the world history of its kind. Table Two below makes a
comparison between China and three developed economies (the UK, the USA and
Japan), in the aspects of the average GDP growth rate per year and the duration of
rapid economic growth.
Table Two: Comparison between China and three developed economies in their
period of rapid economic development
Period of Duration Average GDP
rapid （years） growth rate
economic per year（%）
development
China 1978-2006 27 9.80%
The UK 1881-1890 10 2.70%
The USA 1901-1910 10 5.70%
Japan 1955-1973 19 9.40%
Sources: China Statistical Yearbook 2006, Issued by National Bureau of Statistics, Published by China Statistics
Publishing House, Beijing, 2007; China Statistical Abstract 2006, Issued by National Bureau of Statistics,
Published by China Statistics Publishing House, Beijing, 2007; Monitoring the World Economy: 1820-1992,
written by Angus Maddison, Published by Revolution Publishing House, 1997.
4
In the course of high-speed economic growth in China, urban areas is the initial
contributor. To illustrate this with a fact, in 2005, China’s GDP was 18.39561 trillion
Yuan, among which, 87.6%, that is to say,16.1146 trillion Yuan was created by the
urban areas.
Table Three below shows the proportion that urban areas of prefecture level and
above (districts included) covers in the whole country in 2005, in the categories of
some major economic indicators. From the table, we can see that the land area of
urban areas of prefecture level and above covers 6.0% of the total nationwide, the
population covers 27.8%, while the GDP created covers 59.39%. In terms of other
indicators, the proportions all surpass 60%, and notably, the industrial output of
foreign-funded enterprises in these areas covers 81.2% of the total nationwide, and the
number of institutions of higher learning covers 91.9% of the total.
Table Three: Some major economic indicators: Urban areas of prefecture level
and above (districts included)/Nationwide (unit: %, Year: 2005)
Urban areas of Proportion: urban
Total
prefecture level and areas of prefecture
Nationwide
above (districts level and
included) above/nationwide(%)
Land Resources (unit: ten
960.0 57.4 6.0
thousand square kilometers)
Total population by the end of
the year (unit: ten thousand 130756.0 36285.0 27.8
people)
Total Regional output (unit: 100
183084.8 109743.3 59.9
million Yuan)
Primary Industry 23070.4 4318.7 18.7
Secondary Industry 87046.7 55094.1 63.3
Tertiary Industry 72967.7 50330.4 69.0
Total volume of fixed asset
investment (unit: 100 million 88773.6 51472.0 58.0
Yuan)
#Real estate development 15909.2 11610.1 73.0
Fiscal Revenues of local
government (unit: 100 million 14884.2 9094.4 61.1
Yuan)
Total volume of import and
export of goods (unit: 100 14219.1 8597.0 60.5
million US Dollars)
Total industrial output (unit:
251619.5 162617.2 64.6
100 million Yuan)
Output of Foreign-funded
51548.4 41849.6 81.2
enterprises
5
Annual average balance of net
89460.5 56158.5 62.8
fixed assets
Sales revenues of consumption
67176.6 40922.1 60.9
goods (unit: 100 million Yuan)
Number of institutions of higher
1792 1646 91.9
learning
Source：China Statistical Yearbook 2006, Issued by National Bureau of Statistics, Published by China Statistics
Publishing House, Beijing, 2007.
1.2.2. The industrial structure of the urban areas has been optimized, and the
industrial efficiency has been improved.
Urban areas plays the leading role in optimizing the industrial structure and enhancing
the industrial efficiency in China. Table Four Below compares the industrial structure,
employment structure and industrial efficiency among the urban areas of prefecture
level and above in the year 2000 and 2005.
6
Table Four: Industrial structure, employment structure and industrial efficiency:
comparison among the urban areas of prefecture level and above in 2000 and
2005
Year2000 Year 2005
The Whole
The whole
Districts Urban Districts
Urban Areas
Areas
Industrial Primary
15.1 4.8 12.6 3.9
Structure Industry
Secondary
（%） 46.6 50.3 47.5 50.2
Industry
Tertiary
38.3 44.8 39.9 45.9
Industry
Employment Primary
13.5 3.9 3.5 1.1
Structure Industry
Secondary
（%） 39.5 49.0 43.9 48.6
Industry
Tertiary
47.0 47.0 52.6 50.2
Industry
Industrial Secondary
6.9 5.9 19.2 17.4
Efficiency Industry
（unit: ten
thousand Tertiary
4.7 5.4 13.1 15.3
Yuan per Industry
person）
Sources：China Statistical Yearbook 2001 and China Statistical Yearbook 2006, Issued by National
Bureau of Statistics, Published by China Statistics Publishing House, Beijing.
From Table Four, we can see the economic development in China’s urban areas of
prefecture level and above (hereinafter referred to as “these areas” in the next
three paragraphs) has the following features:
First, just like the rest of the nation, these areas are still in the process of
industrialization, with the proportion of the primary industry going down, while
the proportions of manufacturing industry and service industry continuously going
up.
Second, the transformation of employment structure is faster than the
transformation of industrial structure (whether the industrial structure is rational or
not is measured by the added values of output). Be it in the whole urban areas, or
in the districts, the proportion of employment in the non-agricultural sector is
basically higher than the proportion of added values in the non-agricultural sector.
In terms of the ratio among three types of the industries, it was 44.8:23.8:31.4 in
7
2005; compared with other areas, urban areas of prefecture level and above
obviously take an advantageous position in the employment structure level. This
illustrates that urban industrialization has shifted the agricultural work forces in
these areas to other areas; and in the future, it will mainly be the shift of the
non-urban work forces into the urban areas, in particular to those city
agglomerations (urban areas of prefecture level and above are the core) as well as
those urbanized regions.
Third, thanks to the upgrade of industrial structure, the industrial efficiency in
these areas has improved greatly and rapidly. As a result, the development of
high-efficiency industries is faster than the development of low-efficiency
industries.
1.2.3. The modern manufacturing industry has become one of the main
driving forces for urban development.
Table Five below shows that China is nearly finished with the stage that is
predominated by raw materials production, which is of low and middle-level
technical content. China has now entered into the stage that is predominated by
heavy industrial production, which is featured by advanced processing; and at
current stage, mid and high technology as well as the high-technology industries
have become the initial elements that promote urban development. In this Table,
we list the examples of Shenyang, Shenzhen, Shanghai, Wuhan, Chengdu and
Hangzhou, all of which are the central cities in their respective regions. Here, we
base on the OECD classification of manufacturing technologies to analyze the
technical structure of the manufacturing industry in these central cities. And the
results show that: in these cities, traditional light industry of low technology such
as food, textile, clothing, paper-making and printing industries covers an
ever-decreasing proportion, most of which decrease to below 20% on average;
low and mid-technology industry that is predominated by raw materials
production, such as steel, power, petroleum refining and construction materials
industries are also enjoying smaller shares, falls to between 6% to 24% on average;
while the proportions of mid and high-technology industries as well as the high
technology industries are both over 62%. All these facts illustrate that China has
already stepped into the era of delicate processing industry, and modern
manufacturing industry has become one of the main driving forces for urban
development in China.
Table Five: The technical structure of the
manufacturing industry in the central cities of
different regions of China (2005)
Shenyang Shenzhen Shanghai Wuhan Chengdu Hangzhou
Total Industrial
Output (unit: ten 14921362 62669791 93933722 22999105 13174973 39122751
8
thousand Yuan)
#Low technology 2188647 4299868 15509000 2576974 2556441 12078864
#Low and
mid-technology 2257981 4024315 19396628 5621366 1807700 2708441
#mid and high
technology as well as
high technology 10474734 54345608 59028094 14800765 8810832 24335446
Technical Composition（%）
# Low technology 14.7 6.9 16.5 11.2 19.4 30.9
# Low and
mid-technology 15.1 6.4 20.6 24.4 13.7 6.9
# mid and high
technology as well as
high technology 70.2 86.7 62.8 64.4 66.9 62.2
Source: China Statistical Yearbook 2006, Published by China Statistics Publishing House.
China is a large developing nation, and it will tremendously consume raw materials
for the purpose of energy production in its industrialization process, and it still has a
long way to go until the conservation type of economic system can be well put in
place. Despite this, the entrance into advanced processing industry era shows that
China’s economic development has seen less reliance on the high
energy-consuming industries. As long as we continue to work hard to upgrade
industrial structure and solve environmental problems, we believe that the harmony
between economic development and resources conservation, environmental
protection can be achieved in the midst of transition to the new type of
industrialization.
1.2.4. There are pronounced discrepancies among difference regions in terms
of urbanization rate.
In the process of urbanization, the greatest challenges in resources and environment
do not come from urban economic development, but lie in the mid and west regions,
where there are many rural areas totally uncovered by the benefits of urbanization,
or the urbanization rate is still very low. In this chapter, we focus on comparing the
differences in urbanization rate among regions as well as the analysis of related
sustainable development issue. And the issues of ecological environment and
rural-urban dual structure will be stated in detail in Chapter Two and Chapter Three.
It should be noted that China is a developing economy, and development is its
central task. In China’s interpretation, development should bring benefits and cover
all the provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions. Chart Two shows the
changes of urbanization rate in each province, municipality directly led by the
central government and autonomous region in 1982, 1990 and 2000. From the Chart,
we see that the urbanization rate has been constantly improving in all the 30
9
provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions, except for Hong Kong, Macao
and Taiwan. Actually, the regional discrepancies in China are the relative
discrepancies, not absolute ones; they are in fact gaps in the speed of development
among different regions. In China, there is no such phenomenon at all: some
regions enjoy fast development, while others stagnate or even have absolute
recessions. Such situation does not exist in China; for a large developing economy,
it is truly a great achievement and such an achievement does not come easy.
Nevertheless, it must be admitted that discrepancies in urbanization rate among
different regions are quite large. Chart Two demonstrates the overall trend of
urbanization development in each region, as well as the relative discrepancies from
one another. In 2000, the urbanization rates of the four regions are as follows:
northeast region enjoys the highest level with a 52.4%; coastal region comes after
with a 45.7%; while the mid and west regions are almost on the same level, reading
29.3% and 28.8% respectively. However, the urbanization rates of different
provinces vary quite much from each other: on tier one are the three municipalities
directly led by the central government, namely Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai,
which enjoy the highest level of urbanization, with over 70% of urban population in
each municipality. Therefore, these three cities can be regarded as urbanized areas.
Then on tier two are some of the provinces whose proportions of urban population
are above the national average level, and they are: Guangdong, Liaoning,
Heilongjiang, Jilin, Jiangsu, Shandong, Zhejiang, Fujian, Hainan and Hubei. And
on the last tier are some of the provinces in the mid and west regions that enjoy the
lowest level of urbanization, namely: Yunan, Guizhou, Tibet, Gansu and Henan; the
proportions of these provinces are all below 25%. While the rest of the mid and
west regions are all below the national average of urbanization rate, which is
36.09%.
Chart Two: Urbanization Rate in each province based on the census in 1982,
1990 and 2000
100
1982年城市化水平
80
城市 化水 平（％ ）
1990年城市化水平
60 2000年城市化水平
40
Chart Two Urbanization level in each province based on the census in 1982, 1990 and 2000
20
Notes: 1. on the left in vertical direction: urbanization level (%);
0
2. on the right side, the first line means urbanization level in 1982;urbanizati line
黑龙 江
内蒙 古
上海
北京
天津
广东
辽宁
浙江
福建
江苏
海南
山东
河北
广西
吉林
湖北
山西
湖南
安徽
江西
河南
青海
新疆
重庆
宁夏
陕西
四川
甘肃
贵州
云南
西藏
means
Notes: 1. On the left in the vertical direction: urbanization rate (%);
2. In the horizontal level are all names of provinces and municipalities. From left to right: Shanghai,
Beijing, Tianjin, Guangdong, Liaoning, Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangsu, Hainan, Shandong, Hebei, Guangxi,
Heilongjiang, Jilin, Inner Mongolia, Hubei, Shanxi, Hunan, Anhui, Jiangxi, Henan, Qinghai, Xinjiang,
10
Chongqing, Ningxia, Sha’anxi, Sichuan, Gansu, Guizhou, Yunnan and Tibet.
3. On the right: the first line means urbanization rate in 1982; the second line means urbanization rate
in 1990; and the third line means urbanization rate in 2000.
Table Six further reflects the differences in urbanization rate among four regions
in China. We can see that northeast region has entered into being an urbanized
society of elementary level; coastal region leads nearly 10 percentage points than
the national average in terms of urbanization rate; while mid and west regions
have not even touched the beginning point for rapid growth of urbanization, as
shown on the Logistic Curve (by Ray M. Northam).
Table Six: Differences in Urbanization rate among four regions in China
Proportion of urban
population in 2000（％）
Coastal Region 45.7
Middle Region 29.3
West Region 28.8
Northeast Region 52.4
Nationwide 36.2
Notes: Coastal region refers to the ten provinces (including three municipalities directly led by the central
government), including Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Shandong, Jiangsu, Shanghai, Zhejiang, Fujian, Guangdong
and Hainan; middle region refers to six provinces, including Shanxi, Henan, Anhui, Jiangxi, Hubei and
Hunan; western region refers to twelve provinces (including one municipality directly led by the central
government), including Sha’anxi, Gansu, Ningxia, Qinghai, Xinjiang, Chongqing, Sichuan, Yunnan,
Guizhou, Tibet, Guangxi and Inner Mongolia; and northeast region includes three provinces, namely
Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang.
Table Six shows that: apart from the first-class cities like Shanghai, the
urbanization rates of most of the regional centers (basically central cities) do not
have obvious discrepancy from one another. The regional discrepancies in China
lie in the discrepancies of urbanization level among regions; that is to say, there
are many cities in the relatively developed regions, while there are too few cities
in the less developed regions. The differences in urbanization level have
determined the situation of cross-regional population flows in China, as well as
the differences in the sustainable development strategy among different regions.
(5) There are regional differences in terms of the situation of cross-regional
population flows and strategy of sustainable development.
11
Chart Three below demonstrates the volume and direction of the cross-regional
population flows in China in the year 2000.
262,000
268,000
dnv
44.4,000,
1.068 million
846,000
1.457million
人
16. 15 million
797,000
Chart Three Distribution of Population Flow in 2000
Notes: 1.“万” means ten thousand.
2. From up to down on the left: west region of China, middle region of China; from up to down on
the right: northeast region of China, coastal region of China.
According to Chart Three, the cross-provincial population flows bear the following
features: population in the mid and west regions flow out in a large amount to the
coastal region, reaching over 10 million people on average. There are population
outflows from coastal and east regions, too, to the west region, and the number is
around 1 to 2 million on average. Then there are population flows in other directions
among different regions, and the average number of flowing population ranges from
one hundred thousand to several hundred thousand. But generally speaking, coastal
region enjoys the fast economic development, and this region also attracts the largest
number of population inflows.
In the future, against the background of urbanization, it is expected that the population
migration among different regions will have the following trends:
First, coastal region boasts advantages in its geographical location, financial
conditions, resources and environment for development. For this reason, it will
continue to enjoy the fastest development, and continue to be the major attraction for
population migration.
Among the three urban groups in the coastal region, the Yangtze River Delta boasts
rather high-quality industrial development, and rather large capacity for natural
resources and environment. It is likely that the city agglomeration in the Yangtze
River Delta area is going to expand to the west alongside the Yangtze River, and as a
result, this city agglomeration will become the initial attraction for population
inflows during the “eleventh five year plan” or even in a longer run.
12
The Pearl River Delta will have increasing demand for migrant workforces, and
meanwhile will achieve an upgraded technical structure of the workforces.
On the contrary, the area of Beijing—Tianjin—Tangshan will have decreasing
demand for migrant workforces. It is true that the city agglomeration in this area has
huge potentials for economic growth. But due to the constraints by natural resources,
especially the constraints by limited water resources, we should constrain the urban
expansion in this area. It is necessary to put in place conservation type of economic
system. In addition, it is also a must to define the border and limitation for urban
development and expansion in a compulsory manner. By doing this, the speed of
migrant workforce inflows can be to some extent reduced.
Besides, as a result of rapid development, city agglomerations in Shandong
peninsulas, southeastern Fujian province and eastern Zhejiang province will also
become important areas to attract migrant population.
Second, the middle region will remain a major place for population outflows.
The economic development and employment expansion in the middle region lag
behind those of the coastal region; plus the fact that there are a lot of redundant
rural workforces to migrate, and they will more and more prefer to carry their
family with them in the migration. All these factors will result as large-scale
population outflows from the mid region to the coastal and northeast regions.
In the middle region, city agglomerations in Wuhan, central Henan, Changzhutan,
Hefei, Nanchang, Taiyuan and the city agglomeration along the Yangtze River have
all witnessed substantial development. Therefore, these places will provide the main
accommodations for mid and long-distance population migration within the mid
region.
Third, the population flows of northeast region will undergo transformation. So far,
this region has more population outflows than inflows, but it is likely to have more
population inflows than outflows in the future.
According to the official census, the inflow population into the northeast region
covers 4.1% of the national total of its kind, while the outflow population from this
region covers 5.1% of the national total of its kind, with a net outflow population of
404,000 people. With the improvement of investment environment and further
economic growth, northeast region will have a larger demand for workforces. Under
such circumstances, it is likely to achieve a preliminary balance between the
workforce inflows and outflows the difference will be within the range of 100,000
（
people）; it is also possible that there will be workforce inflows into this region on a
massive scale.
The city agglomeration in mid and south Liaoning province will enjoy the fastest
13
development among all the city agglomerations in the northeast region. Besides,
agglomerations in Harbin, central Jilin province and border areas will run on a
faster track for development. Therefore, these places will become the main places to
provide accommodations for population migration within the northeast region.
Fourth, west region will see more rapid and larger-scale population outflows, and it
will gradually become the region that has the largest number of population outflows.
To be specific:
① As the coastal region, northeast region and mid region continue to develop,
they will have greater capacity to absorb more workforces from the west region.
② As the west region development strategy deepens, the basic infrastructure
network has been established preliminarily in the west region; there are more and
more communication and information exchanges between the west region and
other parts of China; citizens in the west region have greater hope and
expectations for the development of China, in particular the young generation;
they are more actively and eagerly engaged in the industrialization and
urbanization construction, compared with their older generation.
③ West region has relatively inadequate control on its population growth,
therefore, it has become the region that is faced with the fastest growth of
workforces, increasing pressure of employment and thus, has the greatest
motivation for population outflows. Ever since the 21st century, the distribution of
population growth among regions has undergone significant changes, and the west
region is now enjoying the largest number of population growth in terms of the
absolute growth volume. From 2000 to 2004, the population growth in the west
region reached 15.96 million, which has surpassed that of the middle region; the
latter had a growth of 14.73 million people during the same period of time.
④ In this west region, city agglomerations in ChengduChongqing area and
Guanzhong area have gained momentum of development. However, limited by the
geographical locations as well as the insufficient systemic innovation and
pre-employment training, the overall competitiveness of these city agglomerations
is not so strong as the city agglomerations in the coastal region and northeast
region; and besides, job opportunities and job creation in this region cannot keep
pace with the increasing number of workforces to be employed. For these reasons,
a large of workforces in the west region will continue to migrate to the coastal
region and other regions.
Because of the differences in the situation of each region, the main tasks and
strategy for sustainable development in the process of urbanization are inevitably
varied from one another among regions. Specifically speaking:
14
The coastal region, when enjoying its fast development of urbanization, bears on
shoulders two core responsibilities: first is to strengthen the resources and
environmental protection in the region, and to achieve harmony between man and
nature; second is to reform substantially the management system of population
flows, and to establish a framework for an accommodating, fair and
people-oriented Hukou system, so that the migrant population from the mid and
west regions can be transformed into urban population in the real sense; and thus,
the economic growth and ecological construction in the mid and west regions can
bear lesser burdens caused by the large population.
The west region is the source region for many key rivers, and it is also the
production base for many important mineral products in China. But because of
the special natural conditions, the ecological environment in this region is
extremely fragile. It is fair to say, ecological environment construction in the west
region is one of the factors that can determine the success or failure of sustainable
development in China. To put it in the perspective of urbanization, the top priority
for the west region is to accomplish high-quality basic education and professional
education, and on this basis, to send its large number of workforces to other
regions in China as much as possible, so that the burdens caused by huge
population on the ecological environment can be alleviated. In addition to this, it
also remains important tasks for the west region to rationalize the regional layout,
to develop regional city agglomerations, counties and central towns, so as to
absorb rural population as much as possible, thus, reducing the pressure on the
rural ecological environment. And last but not the least, it is essential to input
resources for the enhancement of ecological infrastructures, in order to provide
strong support for the sustainable development in China.
From nationwide, the mid and northeast regions are on the average level of
development, but they have already stepped on the track for rapid growth of
industrialization and urbanization. Based on this situation, the strategy of
sustainable development for these two regions should be as follows: for those city
agglomerations and urbanized areas, it is important to utilize land resources in an
efficient manner through rational, scientific urban planning; and to utilize energy
resources and other raw materials resources efficiently by means of industrial
upgrading; to create more job opportunities and improve training, social security
and public housing construction for the migrant population and urban low and
mid-income group, mainly through system innovation, so as to lay a solid
foundation for building up a harmonious society. For those county areas, priorities
should be given to promoting the development of counties and central towns, and
notably, such development should abandon the “coastal region style”, namely
over-diverged paths of industrialization and urbanization, so as to avoid the
resulting divergence and regionalization of the environmental issues, and to
pursue the “converged economic effects” instead. For the huge rural areas, focus
should be on providing equally good public services (relative to the urban areas)
15
to the rural residents by means of coordinating development between rural and
urban areas, thus, enabling a constantly improving environment for rural areas
that have a gradually decreasing population (in absolute volume), and ensuring
consistently enhancing public services to the rural residents.
China boasts a large territory as well as regions that have different conditions from
one another. In this case, the sustainable development in China is more complex
and challenging, compared with that of other countries. But meanwhile, there
would be more space for the sequenced promotion and development of
industrialization and urbanization in China, and thus, there would be greater
potentials for maintaining long-term sustainable development. In the next two or
three decades to come, China will put in place more solid economic and social
foundations for the implementation of sustainable development strategy, through
promoting the new type of industrialization and urbanization in a steady, sound
manner.
1.3. The Outlook of Urbanization in China
Currently, China is undergoing rapid economic growth and transformation of
systems, and there are inevitably lots of uncertainties in its prospects of economic
and social development, thus, posing difficulties and challenges for scientific
predictions about development. It is fair to say that all the predictions about
urbanization made by the Chinese scholars before the year 2000 are imprecise.
The basic evidence is: the scholars conclude that the urbanization rate improved
by 5.3% according to the result of the population census in 2000; and this was
obviously a groundless figure, which was impossible to achieve based on the
situation then; because in reality, it would take at least six to eight years to
achieve this rate. In addition, the impact of system innovation on the urbanization
development, in particular its impact on the changes and development of certain
stage of urbanization, cannot be reflected and explained by any theoretical
models of urbanization.
China is undergoing its system transformation, and under such circumstances,
system plays an important role in the development of urbanization. In future years
to come, the Chinese government will constantly deepen its system reform,
aiming to gradually establish a system framework that well fits the development
of urbanization. And the system reform in China must be carried out step by step,
and needs to be revised and adjusted to keep current with the changing situation.
Therefore we can say that the trend of system innovation for the sake of China’s
urbanization is certain, but its speed and content are hard to determine. Under
such circumstances, we have analyzed the urbanization development in China
with the “speed analysis method”, and drawn some conclusions on the possible
scenarios in the future, based on the assumption of different speeds; and then we
make predictions in a comprehensive manner about the outlook of urbanization,
16
on the basis of these conclusions and models that are mentioned above.
According to our analysis of the transitioning urbanization, the average speed of
urbanization in the future is most likely to increase by 0.5 to 0.8 percentage point
per year. For more details, please see Table Seven below.
Table Seven: Urbanization Development at Different Speeds
(Unit: %, ten thousand people)
Average
Increased Increased
Speed of Total Urbanization Urban Rural
Year Urban Urban
Urbanization Population Rate (%) Population Population
Population Population
Per Year
2004 129988 41.8 54335 75653
0.5 2010 134177 44.8 60111 74066 5776 963
2020 139920 49.8 69680 70240 9569 957
2004 129988 41.8 54283 75705
0.6 2010 134177 45.4 60916 73261 6633 1106
2020 139920 51.4 71919 68001 17636 1100
2004 129988 41.8 54283 75705
0.8 2010 137000 46.6 63842 73158 9559 1593
2020 146000 54.6 79716 66284 25433 1587
2004 129988 41.8 54283 75705
1.0 2010 137000 47.8 65486 71514 11203 1867
2020 146000 57.8 84388 61612 30105 1890
Note: The prediction of total population is provided by the National Population and Family Planning Commission.
The speed of urbanization in China mainly depends on two factors: one is the job
opportunities and employment situation in the context of industrialization; the
other is to what extent the system innovation can bring benefits to the rural
citizens that reside in the urban areas and ensure the high quality of their daily life.
Then in theory, an annual growth of 0.8-percentage point in urbanization speed
can be achieved through hard work and efforts. The reasons are as follows:
From 1996 to 2003, the average annual increase of job opportunities in the
non-agricultural sector was nearly 7 million. Supposing that the new type of
industrialization will substantially create more job opportunities, then the annual
increase of job opportunities in the non-agricultural sector will reach 10 million in
that new era; multiplied by the coefficient 1.5, which represents the migrant
workforces that bring family with them, then the annual increase of urban
population in China is likely to reach 15 million by then; and this figure actually
means a 0.8-percentage point increase in urbanization rate per year. However,
such a goal cannot be accomplished without huge, unremitting efforts from the
Chinese government and people, and notably, there are several tasks that need to
17
be fulfilled: first is to accelerate steps to push forward the industrialization process;
second is to eliminate obstacles for the improvement of population flows
management system. These two tasks are severe challenges for the development
of China and are both hard to be accomplished. In spite of this, it is absolutely
possible for us to realize the goals, as long as we spend efforts in an efficient,
conscientious way. Such a possibility can find its ground in the regularities of
industrial development and justified by China’s national conditions and the path
that the Chinese government has chosen towards modernization. If the
urbanization process can reap an annual increase of 0.8 percentage point in a
healthy, sound manner, then it will be an ideal, realistic, stable urbanization
process that can bring substantial benefits to all citizens. And we do look forward
to such kind of growth.
At the same time, China should set the threshold for annual growth of
urbanization speed at 0.5 percentage point. If the annual increase of urbanization
speed is 0.5 percentage point, then the annual increase of urban population would
be 9.63 million people. But actually, from 1995 to 2004, the average annual
increase of total population was 9.85 million people, which was higher than the
growth of urban population in the case of 0.5 percentage point increase in
urbanization speed. If the growth of urban population is lower than the growth of
total population, then the growth coefficient of urban population in China is likely
to fall back to below 1, and that means the rural population in China still has
potentials to go up. If such things really happen, it will impose obstacles on
solving the problems of “agriculture, farmers and rural areas”, and consequently,
the coordination of rural and urban development would not be realized, and the
construction of a people-oriented, harmonious society would be greatly
challenged. Therefore, we believe that the system innovation in China should be
carried out in a gradual manner, but must have a threshold, that is to say, the
number of rural citizens that migrate into urban areas must be larger than the
natural growth volume of rural population; or to interpret this in another way, the
total growth volume of urban population must be larger than the growth volume
of the total population worldwide. Only by setting such a threshold, can the
growth coefficient of urban population maintain at above 1, so that there can be
benign circle of development between urban and rural areas, thus, preventing the
further deterioration of rural-urban dual structure.
To sum up, we suggest that an annual growth of 0.8-percentage point should be
the goal for China’s urbanization speed, and an annual increase of
0.5-percentage point in urbanization speed should be the minimum threshold. In
the future, China is likely to achieve a 0.5 to 0.8-percentage point increase in
urbanization speed, while pursuing a healthy, sound development manner.
18
1.4. China’s Urbanization in the International Arena and the Rise of China
in the 21st Century
By the end of the 20th century, the urban population increase in China covered
one fourth of the world’s total urban population growth. The urbanization in
China is a determining factor of the rising of Chinese economy, and therefore, it
is also an important force that can to some extent determine the future of world
urbanization development.
1.4.1. The growth of urban population in China covers one fourth of the total
growth of urban population worldwide.
China’s urbanization undertaking is an indispensable part in the world’s
urbanization process. The simple truth can illustrate this: China is a large
developing economy, with a total population of 1.29227 billion people in the year
2003; that means China covers 24.96% of the total population in all developing
economies, therefore, China’s urbanization is also an important force that can to
some extent determine the future of world urbanization situation in the 21st
century. From 1975 to 2000, the urban population in the world had an increase of
1.317 billion people in total, with an annual increase of 52.68 million people in
the urban areas; among the total increase, the urban population growth among
developing economies was 1.164 billion people, with an annual growth of 46.52
million people in urban areas. Meanwhile, from 1978 to 2003, the urban
population in China had an increase of 351.5 million people in total, with an
annual increase of 14.05 million people, which means, China contributes 26.7%
of the annual growth of urban population to the world, and contributes 30.2% of
the annual growth of urban population to the whole developing nations’ world.
Therefore, it is fair to say that China plays an important role in promoting the
urbanization process around the world in the 21st century.
1.4.2. The urbanization of China is the key theme for the human
development in the 21st century.
In July 2000, the Nobel Prize winner for Economics, Professor Joseph E. Stiglitz
said: “Both China’s urbanization and high-tech development (in the United States)
will be the two overriding issues, which have a profound effect on the
development of human beings in the 21st century”（Wu Liangyong，2003）.
He has good reasons to make this judgment. Not just because of the large scale of
China’s urbanization, but more importantly, urbanization is the determining
factor for the rise of China. In the future, the healthy, sound development of
urbanization will become the solution to series of significant strategic issues in
China. The healthy development of urbanization is the market basis for China to
realize economic expansion and industrial restructuring in the era of new type of
19
industrialization, and it also provides the platform for the participation in efficient
production by the Chinese citizens, as well as for the stimulation of social
consumption; it is the fundamental way to solve the problems of “agriculture,
farmers and rural areas”, and serves as the essential motivations for wealth
accumulation; it is an indispensable tool to ensure the smooth communication
between people and efficient functioning of society in the information era, and
can be taken as an effective measure for the building of a lifetime-learning
society, as well as for the strengthening of human resources accumulation; it is a
key driving force for the innovation of the nation, for the improvement of core
competitiveness of the nation, both in economic and technical terms; it is the key
to realize the goals of sustainable development, and serves as the strategic
guarantee for the rise of Chinese nation in the world arena. China has one-fifth of
the world’s total population, and its rise will have significant impact on the world
situation, and it will set an example and provide lessons and experience to the rest
of the developing nations, in the aspects of urbanization and modernization; this
will surely be beneficial to the world peace and development. Such historic
significance has determined that China’s urbanization is one of the key themes
for human development in the 21st century.
2. The Environmental Issues in China’s Urbanization Process and Their
Outlooks
The core of sustainable development includes two dimensions, namely: the pursuit
of harmony between man and nature, and pursuit of harmony among human
beings in the process of development. Once the harmony between man and mature
is destroyed, a series of ecological and environmental problems will emerge; and if
the harmony among human beings is challenged, lots of social conflicts will come
out.
In the urbanization process, China has given the top priority to economic growth
for quite a long time, and plus the fact that system reform seriously lags behind
relative to the pace of economic growth; these factors have led to the
accumulation of a large number of severe environmental and social problems,
despite the fact that China has won world recognition for its achievement in
economic development. The environmental and resources issues as well as the
social conflicts emerging from urbanization process are very broad, extensive
topics; this report only focuses on the statement and analysis of the core parts of
this big issue.
2.1. The Ecological Environment Issues in China’s Urbanization Process
The ecological resources in China are among the richest in the world, while the
ecological environment in China is among the most fragile in the world. In fact,
20
the ecological environment issue is the most complex issue in the urbanization
process and is the most difficult problem to solve. Due to the climatic and
geographical reasons, a series of ecologically fragile areas have been formed,
such as the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and Yellow River, the karst
topography areas, the dry desert areas and the loess gully areas. What is even
worse, the population in China has kept on growing constantly; and for a long
time, the attention has been excessively given to economic growth; instead, the
ecological environment has for years been damaged seriously, leading to many
ecological problems.
2.1.1. The Ecological Environment in China
The ecological environment problems in China are very complex, and some of
the most serious and pronounced ones are listed as follows:
① The total area of forests grows ponderously, and the coverage of forests is very
low.
The scale and quality of forest resources are the determining factors for a
country’s ecological environment. In history, China used to be a country with rich
forest resources. However, due to the exploding growth of population and
increasingly intensive exploration of land resources, the forest resources in China
have seen gradual decreases. According to the historical documentation (Jiang
Zehui, 2007), the coverage of forests in China used to be as large as 60% about
four or five thousand years ago. Then in Han Dynasty, the coverage of forests
decreased to below 50%, due to the expansion of agricultural industry and
activities. After that, from Tang Dynasty to Song Dynasty, the coverage dropped
to around 21%, and further dropped to only 8.6% when the People’s Republic of
China was founded. The Chinese government has always attached great
importance to the ecological protection and forests construction; but because of
the huge damages of forests in history, along with some other reasons, the total
area of forests in China has been growing ponderously, and for a long time, the
coverage of forests cannot be improved in a substantial manner (Table Eight
below shows the total area and coverage of forests in China ever since 1949).
Compared with Japan, the neighboring country, China is seriously in short of the
forest resources: Japan boasts a territory of 370,000 square kilometers and a total
forest area of over 250,000 square kilometers, with forest coverage of about 66%.
Table Eight Area and Coverage of Forests since 1949
Coverage Total Area of
of （
Forests unit: ten
Forests thousand square
（%） kilometers）
21
1949 8.6 82.6
1962 11.8 113.3
1976 12.7 121.9
1981 12.0 115.2
1988 16.6 158.9
2003 18.2 174.8
Source: The Forest Resources and Its Sustainable Development, Written by Jiang Zehui, Published by
Science Publishing House, 2007.
② The degradation of grasslands and desertification of lands are very serious.
According to the State of the Environment in China 2003, China boasts a total
grassland area of nearly 400 million hm2, covering 41.7% of the total territory of
China. Among these 400 million hm2 of grasslands, 84.4% locates in the west
region. But due to social and historical reasons, 90% of the usable natural
grasslands in China have suffered from degradation of varied degrees. And the
mildly degraded area of grasslands covers about 50%, and the seriously degraded
grasslands come to nearly 180 million hm2 in area. The degradation of ecological
system on prairie has led to the deteriorating quality of grasslands, sharp declines
in plants coverage, the weakening of water reservation and maintenance functions
of the grasslands; as well as the serious desertification of lands.
The degradation of lands in China main takes two forms, namely: to degrade into
sandy deserts and to degrade into rocky deserts. According to the third national
investigation on the wastelands, the desertification of lands in China has become
one of the most serious among all the developing nations. In 2004, the area of
desertified lands was 1.7393 million Km2, covering 18.12% of the total territory of
China; these desertified lands are widely dispersed in 889 counties (including
counties and districts) of 30 provinces (including municipalities and autonomous
regions), except for Shanghai, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao special
administrative regions. Every year, sandstorms causes economic losses of over 1.3
billion Yuan in China, and the indirect economic losses caused by land
desertification and its derivatives amounts to about 288.9 billion Yuan（Ou Yang
zhiyun, 2007）.
Similar to the desertification of lands in north China, the southwest part of China
suffers from severe degradation into rocky deserts, as a result of irrational
exploration of lands and damages of forests. By the end of 1999, the total area of
rocky deserts in Sichuan, Chongqing, Guizhou, Yunnan and Guangxi amounted to
7.295 million hm2. According to the sample survey in Guangxi in 2005, the area of
rocky deserts in Guangxi province reached 35 million acres, and such an area still
kept on enlarging at the rate of an average 3%-5% each year（Ou Yang zhiyun,
2007）. These rocky deserts are geographically dispersed in a converging manner,
and coincidentally, the related areas also converge the largest number of poor
22
people from these five provinces. Some of these rocky desert areas have already
been deprived of basic conditions for human survival; therefore, these rocky deserts
are the main contributor to the poverty in the region.
③ The climate is getting warmer and flood disasters happen frequently.
The worldwide industrialization has caused global warming. In the case of China,
the climatic changes are even more severe, due to exceeding interference of
human activities. During the past fifty years, the temperature of the east coastal
region grew by 0.260C per year, west region by 0.180C annually. The north part
has seen more and more drought; the Yangtze River Delta frequently suffers from
flood disasters; and the frequency of catastrophic storms increases from once
every ten years in the 1950s, to nine times every ten years in the 1990s.Due to the
frequent climate disasters, the affected area and suffered area have long remained
large, and the suffered area ratio has for a long time been above 40%. Please see
Chart Four for the details.
Chart Four: The land: changes in affected area, suffered area and suffered
area ratio from 1978 to 2005
Note: 1.In vertical direction on the left: one thousand hectares;
2.in horizontal direction, from left to right: affected area (one thousand hectares), suffered area (one
thousand hectares); and suffered area ratio (%).
2.1.2. The Relationship between Ecological Environment Problems and
Urbanization as well as its Outlook
The reasons that lead to the ecological environment problems in China are very
complicated and are of multi-dimensions, including historical, natural and
humanistic reasons. From the perspective of urbanization, the main reasons
include: the urbanization level in China is generally low; there is a large
population that relies heavily on ecological environment, for the sake of survival;
people pay too much attention to the economic growth, at the cost of neglecting
the protection and construction of ecological environment.
The process of urbanization in China is in fact the process in which, rural
23
population flows to the urban areas; population from the backward areas flows to
the developed areas; it is a process in which, significant changes occur to the
population structure across different regions. This process can help to alleviate
the population pressure in the ecologically fragile areas. Chart Five below reflects
the changes in population structure and population distribution across regions in
the United States.
Chart Five: Changes in population migration and population distribution in
the urbanization process of the United States
Note: In horizontal direction, from left to right: northeast part, mid and west part, west part and south part.
One of the most basic national conditions is: there are too many people but too
limited land resources. Such a conflict between man and land is extremely
obvious in the ecologically fragile west region. Since the reform and opening up,
China has accelerated its steps in urbanization development; however, the
cross-regional population migration moves ponderously, and the underdeveloped
areas still suffer from burdens caused by huge population. This is because of the
following three reasons:
First, the overall level of urbanization in China is low, and there is a large number
of rural people in every region of the country;
Second, generally speaking, most of the ecologically fragile areas are backward
areas; the overall competence of the people in these areas is relatively low, and
they take a disadvantageous position in the competition of urban labor force
market. The steps of population outflows in these areas are ponderous, or we can
say, these areas are the slowest in terms of releasing the burdens on ecological
environment;
Third, the process of Hukou system reform lags far behind the process of
urbanization; as a result, many migrant population fails to bring family with them
in the end, so many of these migrant people have not become urban citizens in the
real sense, although they have been calculated into statistics as rural citizens.
These people, along with their family members still rely heavily on the farmlands
for their survival and development, thus, posing more pressure of varied degrees
24
on ecological environment.
Due to the above-mentioned reasons, we can say, the rapid development of
urbanization in China has neither changed the situation of rural-urban population
distribution in a fundamental manner, nor has changed the population distribution
among regions; that is why the pressure on ecological environment has not been
reduced in the real sense. Chart Six shows the changes in the proportion that
population of each region covers in the total population nationwide; and Chart
Seven shows the changes in total population of each region. (Both charts refer to
the year of 1990, 2000 and 2005). And from these two charts, we can tell the
obvious contrasts between China and the U.S. in terms of the features of
population flows; and Chart Seven reflects that in China, the population
distribution among regions almost remains the same during the 15 years.
Although the population growth in the coastal region is faster than that in the mid
and west regions, the latter regions also witness increases in their population
volumes; consequently, the pressure on ecological environment of the mid and
west regions still continue to increase.
Chart Six: The proportion that population of each region covers in the total
population nationwide from 1990 to 2005
Note: In the vertical direction on the right side, from line 1 to line 4, reading: east region, middle region,
northeast region and west region.
Chart Seven:Changes in Total Population of Each Region from 1990 to 2005
Note: In the horizontal direction, from left to right: East region, middle region, northeast region and west
25
region.
There are two basic, essential aspects in the protection of ecological environment.
First, the government should attach great importance to ecological protection and
input huge amount of financial resources into this project, in order to carry out the
large-scale ecological restoration and reconstruction. Second, taking the
opportunities of industrialization and urbanization, the government should try to
create more favorable environment for rural citizens who reside in the urban areas;
so that a large number of population that used to pose pressure on ecological
environment can be transferred to other areas, and as a result, the burdens on
ecologically fragile environment can be reduced, thus, laying foundation for the
restoration and construction of ecological environment.
The Chinese government has always attached great importance to the construction
of ecological environment. To this end, the government has issued a series of
relevant laws and regulations during the past decade, as well as the National
Ecological Environment Construction Plan. Besides, the government has also input
a lot of financial and physical resources; carried out a nationwide survey on
ecological environment as well as division of ecological functions; launched such
significant projects as: protecting natural forests, turning farmlands into forests or
grasslands, preventing and treating sand, building up natural ecological reservation
areas and so on. Table Eight shows the area of forests increases rapidly during the
past five years, and Chart Four shows that since 2000, the total disaster-affected
area, suffered area the suffered area ratio have all declined. It should be pointed out
that these progresses are achieved through the long-term, unremitting efforts by the
Chinese government and people.
The fundamental solutions to reducing the burdens on ecological environment lie in
the healthy, sound development of industrialization and urbanization; lie in the
relevant system innovation; and also lie in the establishment of Hukou management
system and population migration system between rural and urban areas. The Chinese
government is currently working hard to push forward these reforms.
2.2. Energy consumption is huge and environmental problems are very serious.
Energy is the most important strategic resource for a nation; and urban economic
development is one of the largest consumers of the national energy and resources.
This report will focus on the analysis of energy consumption in the urbanization
process of China, instead of elaborating the energy issue in an all-rounded,
extensive way. Table Nine below shows the growth of energy consumption in
China, the elastic coefficient of energy consumption and the elastic coefficient of
production.
26
Table Nine: Energy Consumption and average consumption per unit (ten
thousand Yuan) GDP From 1978 to 2004
Energy
Total Consumption
Total Output of （
GDP current GDP Calculated at the 1978’s
Year Consumption of per unit (ten
Energy price） price level
Energy thousand Yuan)
GDP
（unit: ten thousand （ unit: ten （ unit: 100
GDP (unit: 100
tons of standard thousand tons of million Index （unit: ton）
million Yuan)
coal） standard coal） Yuan）
1978 62770 57144 3624.1 100 3624.1 15.8
1980 63735 60275 4517.8 116.0 4204.0 14.3
1985 85546 76682 8964.4 192.9 6990.9 11.0
1989 101639 96934 16909.2 271.3 9832.2 9.9
1990 103922 98703 18547.9 281.7 10209.1 9.7
1991 104844 103783 21617.8 307.6 11147.7 9.3
1992 107256 109170 26638.1 351.4 12735.1 8.6
1993 111059 115993 34634.4 398.8 14452.9 8.0
1994 118729 122737 46759.4 449.3 16283.1 7.5
1995 129034 131176 58478.1 496.5 17993.7 7.3
1996 132616 138948 67884.6 544.1 19718.7 7.0
1997 132410 137798 74462.6 592.2 21461.9 6.4
1998 124250 132214 78345.2 638.5 23139.9 5.7
1999 109126 130119 82067.5 684.1 24792.5 5.2
2000 106988 130297 89468.1 738.8 26774.9 4.9
2001 120900 134914 97314.8 794.2 28782.6 4.7
2002 138369 148222 105172.3 861.0 31203.5 4.8
2003 159912 170943 117390.2 941.8 34131.8 5.0
2004 184600 197000 136875.9 1031.3 37375.3 5.3
Source: China Statistical Yearbook 2005, Issued by the National Bureau of Statistics, Published by China Statistics
Publishing House, Beijing.
From Table Nine, we can see that with the economic growth, energy consumption
in China has been increasing rapidly. In 1978, the total energy consumption was
571 million tons of standard coal, while in 2004, the total energy consumption
grew to 1.97 billion tons of standard coal, nearly four times of that in 1978. Since
then, China has become the second largest energy consumer in the world, coming
after the United States. And the energy consumption in China has surpassed 10%
of the total energy consumption in the world.
Besides, Table Nine also shows that since 1978, China has seen substantial
progress in the efficiency of energy utilization. The energy consumption per unit
(ten thousand Yuan) GDP decreased substantially from 15.8 tons in 1978 to 5.3
27
tons in 2004. In 2004, the GDP created by each ton of standard coal was 2025
Yuan, while it was merely 577 Yuan in 1978. That means, the efficiency of
energy utilization in China has increased by 2.5 times, compared with that in
1978.
Chart Eight and Nine below shows the respective elastic coefficients of energy
consumption in China and Japan.
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
-0.5
-1
Chart Eight: Elastic Coefficient of Energy Consumption in China (1984-2004)
Chart Eight shows that: From 1978 to 2004, the elastic coefficient of energy
consumption in China went up first and came down later. Since 1998, the
coefficient has maintained upwards, and it is determined by the situation and stage
of China’s economic development. In the mid-1990s, China entered into the stage
of heavy industry, which was characterized by higher energy consumption,
compared with other stages. The rapid development of those
high-energy-consuming industries inevitably leads to the increase of the volumes of
energy consumed. In addition, the urbanization level along with the consumption
level of the citizens grew quickly, and the energy consumed in everyday life by
citizens increased constantly during this period of time. As a result, the elastic
coefficients in 2003 and 2004 were both around 1.6.
Chart Nine below shows the changes in elastic coefficient of energy consumption in
Japan from 1958 to 1990. In this chart, we can see that from 1959 to 1974, when
Japan was at the stage of heavy industry, the elastic coefficient in most years of this
period remained between 1 and 1.79, with the peak of 1.79 reached in 1965.
Therefore, we can say that the increase of energy consumption in China basically
remains on an appropriate level, compared with Japan.
28
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
1958
1960
1962
1964
1966
1968
1970
1972
1974
1976
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
-0.5
-1
-1.5
Chart Nine: Elastic Coefficients of Energy Consumption in Japan
(1958-1990)
But there are two major problems here for China:
① The efficiency of energy consumption in China is a lot lower than that in the
then Japan. In 2004, the energy consumption per ten thousand Yuan GDP was 1.4
tons of standard coal, which can be translated into 11.6 tons of standard coal per
ten thousand US Dollars GDP. While in the case of Japan, the efficiency was 4.96
tons of standard coal per ten thousand US Dollars GDP in 1965. That means, the
efficiency of energy consumption in Japan in 1965 is more than two times that of
the efficiency in China in 2004.
② The national conditions of China is different from that of Japan. China is a large
nation; If its annual GDP growth remains at around 7.2% in the future years to
come, and elastic coefficient of energy consumption remains at about 1.5, then the
total volume of energy needed by the year 2020 will be as high as 10.16 billion
tons of standard coal, which equals to about half of the total volume of energy
worldwide. China will import a huge amount of energy from other countries, and
the pollution emission and environmental problems brought by this will turn to be
more serious. In this case, China must accelerate its steps of technological
advancement, so as to enhance the efficiency of energy utilization.
It should be pointed out that: the consumption of energy and resources in China is
a natural outcome resulting from industrialization and urbanization, especially
because of industrialization. If industrialization is regarded as one of the essential
preconditions, then the urbanization that can bring the “converging economic
effects” can be conducive to enhancing the efficiency of resources utilization and
reducing internal energy consumption. To build up conservation type of industrial
system and national economic system, we must work out solutions to the
establishment of a justified urban system, as well as solutions to the design of
rational industrial layout and structure; only in this way, can we accelerate the
upgrading the industrial structure and put in place a conservation type of industrial
system.
29
2.3. The Urban Environmental Pollution in China and Its Treatment
The rapid growth of urbanization in China has brought lots of resources on the one
hand, and imposed huge environmental pressure upon urban environment on the
other hand. Urban environmental problem is becoming a major obstacle restraining
the economic and social development in China. In recent years, most cities in
China have been making greater efforts in environmental management and
protection and have witnessed remarkable progress; however, the urban
environmental pollution still remains to be serious in general.
2.3.1. The Current Situation of Urban Environmental Pollution in China
All the environmental problems mainly fall into four major categories: first, water
pollution; second, atmospheric pollution; third, noise pollution; fourth, solid waste
pollution. This report focuses on analyzing the problems of urban water pollution
and atmospheric pollution.
① Water Pollution in China’s Urban Areas
Industrial wastewater and domestic wastewater are the main causes for the pollution
of urban surface water and underground water. Table Ten below has shown that the
total discharged volume of wastewater and COD keeps on growing slowly. The
growth of domestic wastewater has outpaced the growth of industrial wastewater,
and it has become the major contributor to the growth of total wastewater discharge
volume. While the discharge volume of urban domestic wastewater has increased
steadily, the treatment of the urban domestic wastewater seriously lags behind. In
2004, the treatment rate of urban domestic wastewater was only 32.3%. Among 500
cities under the quantitative assessment by the State Environmental Protection
Administration of China (the assessment targets at the cities’ situation in the
management and treatment of environment), only 143 have a centralized treatment
(treatment of domestic wastewater) rate of over 60%, accounting for 28.6% of total
cities under assessment; and 193 are of zero centralized treatment rate.
Table Ten The Discharge volume of Wastewater and COD in Each Year
discharge volume of wastewater discharge volume of COD (unit: ten discharge volume of ammonia and
(unit: 100 million tons thousand tons) nitrogen (unit: ten thousand tons)
Industrial Domestic Industrial Domestic Industrial Domestic
year Total Total Total
wastewater wastewater wastewater wastewater wastewater wastewater
1999 401.1 197.3 203.8 1388.9 691.7 697.2 - - -
2000 415.2 194.2 220.9 1445 704.5 740.5 - - -
2001 433 202.6 230.3 1404.8 607.5 797.3 125.2 41.3 83.9
2002 439.5 207.2 232.3 1366.9 584 782.9 128.8 42.1 86.7
30
2003 460 212.4 247.6 1333.6 511.9 821.7 129.7 40.4 89.3
Source：China Statistical Yearbook 2004, issued by National Bureau of Statistics in 2004, Published by China
Statistics Publishing House.
Water pollution has brought serious consequences. It directly affects the quality of
drinking water sources and undermines human health. What is more, it causes
tremendous economic losses to urban industrial production and agricultural
production. In 2005, the State Council issued the Decision on Implementing the
Outlook on Scientific Development and Strengthening Environmental Protection
(hereinafter referred to as “the Decision”), in which, priorities were given to
ensuring the safety of drinking water, strengthening management of the key river
basins as well as treating and preventing water pollution; and these tasks are listed
among the top seven tasks of environmental protection. It has mentioned that the
protected areas of drinking water sources should be identified and adjusted in a
timely manner so that the protection of drinking water sources can be carried out
more efficiently; the backup water sources for urban areas should be put in place
and the safety of drinking water in rural areas must be addressed. In addition, the
Decision also stipulates that the key river basin areas subject to water pollution
treatment include the Huaihe river, Haihe river, Liaohe river, Song Huajiang, Three
Gorges Reservoir area as well as its upper reaches, the Xiao Langdi Reservoir area
as well as its upper reaches, water source sites of South-to-North Water Diversion
project as well as waterway along the river, Taihu Lake, Dianchi Lake and Chaohu
Lake. The industrial wastewater that exceeds the standard must be strictly
prohibited to be discharged directly into rivers, lakes and seas
.
② Atmospheric Pollution in Chinese Cities
In recent years, the overall atmospheric quality in Chinese cities has been improved.
Compared with that of the last two years, the overall air quality in the urban areas
of China has remained unchanged. Air quality in some of the highly polluted cities
has been bettered to some extent. The proportion of “not up to Grade 3” (in terms
of air quality) cities has been lowered. Please see Chart Ten below for the details.
Out of 342 cities under assessment in 2004, 132 cities are up to the Grade 2
Standard in air quality, which is defined by the SEPA as the minimum-qualifying
standard for the air quality in residential areas. These cities as a whole accounted
for 38.6% of the total cities under assessment and such a proportion was 3.1
percentage points higher than the previous year; 141 cities are up to Grade 3 in air
quality, accounting for 41.2% of the total, meaning 9.7 percentage points higher
than the previous year; 69 cities are not up to Grade 3, accounting for 20.2% of the
total, meaning 6.6 percentage points lower than the previous year.
31
50 2002年 2003年 2004年
40
城市比重，％ 30
20
10
0
达标 三级 劣三级
Chart Ten: Comparison of air quality among Chinese cities
Source ： The State of Environment in China 2003 and 2004, issued by State Enironmental Protection
Administration of China (hereinafter referred to as the SEPA).
Notes: 1. In vertical direction on the left: Proportion of cities in each grade category (%);
2. In the horizontal direction on the top, from left to right: year 2002, 2003, 2004.
3.In the horizontal direction at the bottom, from left to right: up to standard; Grade 3; not up to Grade 3
Particles and sulfur dioxide are two main pollutants affecting the air quality of
Chinese cities. From Table 11, we can see that in 2004, 46.8% of cities under
assessment had particles that exceeded Grade 2, meaning an increase of 1.2% over
the previous year; 14.3% of the cities assessed had particles that exceeded Grade 3,
meaning 6.9 percentage points decrease than the previous year. Cities with heavy
particle pollution mainly concentrated in Shanxi, Inner Mongolia, Liaoning, Henan,
Hunan, Sichuan as well as all the provinces (including autonomous regions) in the
Northwestern part of China. 74.3% cities were up to Grade 2 (0.06mg/m3) in terms
of annual concentration of sulfur dioxide, equivalent to the figure of last year; 9.1%
had exceeded Grade 3, lowering by three percentage points than the previous year.
Cities with heavy sulfur dioxide pollution were mainly in such provinces,
autonomous regions, municipalities as Shanxi, Hebei, Henan, Hunan, Hubei,
Yunnan, Inner Mongolia, Gansu, Guizhou, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region,
Sichuan and Chongqing.
Table Eleven: Concentration of Particles and Sulfur Dioxide: Proportion （%）
of Cities in each grade of concentration
Grade of Particles Sulfur Dioxide
Concentration 2003 2004 2003 2004
Up to Grade 2 45.6 46.8 74.4 74.3
Grade 3 33.2 38.9 25.6 25.7
Exceeding Grade 3 21.2 14.3 12.1 9.1
Source：The State of Environment in China, SEPA.2004.
Currently, it has become key tasks for China to reduce total discharges of sulfur
dioxide and to enhance the prevention of atmospheric pollution. The central
government has clearly stipulated that in large and medium-sized cities and their
suburban areas, the construction (or expansion) of coal-fired power plants (except
the heat-power co-production power plants) should be strictly controlled; the
construction (or expansion) of enterprises with high-energy consumption, such as
32
the construction of iron, steel, refinery enterprises should be prohibited. Besides, if
a coal-fired power plant was put into operation before the end of 2004 and if it
exceeds the standard of sulfur dioxide emissions, then it must be installed with
desulfurization facilities by the end of 2010; it is also compulsory for each region to
set objectives for desulfurization based on its own environmental situation, as well
as to formulate and implement plans for the prevention of acid rain and sulfur
dioxide pollution.
2.3.2 Main Reasons for Environmental Problems in Chinese cities
The urban environmental degradation in China is caused by various reasons,
which can be summarized as follows:
① Extensive economic growth mode and steady increase of urban population have
aggravated environmental pressure upon cities.
The urban economic development in China has maintained momentum of rapid
growth. In the long term, it has maintained the extensive growth mode of “high
inputs, high consumption and high emission”. The accelerated urbanization process,
increase of urban population, improvement of people’s living conditions and
upgrading of consumption have all brought greater pressure upon the urban
resources and environmental supply, which have already been very limited. In some
cities, the following aspects have lagged far behind the demand of urban
development and environmental protection, including the supply of heat and coal
gas, wastewater engineering, treatment of urban wastewater, enhancement of
sewage disposal facilities and construction of public green areas. Thus, some of the
environmental problems have failed to be solved in the end, although it was
expected to be addressed through conventional technologies.
② The energy consumption mix in China is predominated by the consumption of
coal; and this has been one of the main reasons that cause pollution.
Energy consumption is a major factor that affects environmental conditions. The
energy consumption mix in China is predominated by the consumption of coal,
which covers nearly 70% of the total consumption, thus, becoming one of the main
reasons for urban environmental pollution in China. The volume of coal fire dust
exhaust accounts for 80% of the total nationwide and sulfur dioxide discharged
accounts for 90% of the total nationwide; the emission of coal slag accounts for one
fifth of the total volume of industrial solid waste disposed. If utilization of coal in
China is up to international advanced level, then we may see reduction of 300
million tons of standard coal in energy consumption annually. And if this can be
achieved, sulfur dioxide will be reduced by 5 million tons, dust will be reduced by
25 million tons, coal slag by 43 million tons, and carbon dioxide by several
hundred tons. Thus, urban environment will be significantly improved.
33
③ The construction of urban environmental infrastructures is backward and
pollution control is inadequate.
Over the past decade, although many cities have undergone drastic developments in
environmental infrastructures, it fails to satisfy the demand brought by the increase
of urban population and urban scale; it is fair to say that urban environmental
infrastructures in China are still backward. According to the statistics about 500
cities in the Quantitative Assessment on the Comprehensive Treatment of Urban
Environment, the average treatment rate of urban domestic wastewater was only
32.3% nationwide, with 193 cities having a rate of zero in their centralized
treatment of urban domestic wastewater; the innocuous disposal rate of urban
domestic sewage was 57.76% on average nationwide, with 160 cities standing at
zero in their innocuous disposal rate of urban domestic sewage; the centralized
treatment rate of hazardous waste (specifically referring to the centralized treatment
rate of medical waste) was 60.44% on average nationwide, with 155 cities standing
at zero in their centralized treatment of hazardous waste.
④ Some cities in China lack scientific and careful planning for urban
environmental protection.
Environmental protection planning is the basis of formulating urban development
plans and economic development plans. Environmental capacity is one of the
scarcest resources in urban development; therefore, only when scientific, careful
environmental planning is carried out, and the environmental capacity of urban
areas (in the geographical sense) as well as the maximum emission of pollutants is
determined, can the functional zoning and industrial layout in cities be planned
rationally. However, at present, some cities in China lack such environmental
planning or their environmental planning has not been incorporated into the urban
development planning. Therefore the functional zoning in cities is in chaos and
many environmental problems in these cities are hard to be addressed as a result.
For example, some cities have built industrial areas at the upper wind port of city
predominant wind direction; consequently, these cities have for years been affected
by industrial waste and wastewater pollution. In some cities, factories and
residential areas are built close to each other (Of course, it is mainly caused by
historical reasons); consequently, the life of urban citizens are seriously disrupted
by industrial production, and industrial production itself is also greatly restrained
by the limit of space and surrounding environment.
⑤ Generally speaking, we lack adequate countermeasures to a series of emerging
environmental issues.
The emerging environmental issues have been identified in the report Urban
Environmental Protection in China that was released by the SEPA in June 2005.
34
Those emerging problems include:
First, the increasing marginalization of urban environmental pollution. The
pollution of water body (including surface water and underground water) in the
surrounding area of cities, soil pollution and atmospheric pollution are the most
pronounced problems, which affect the coordinated development within urban
areas and between urban and rural areas.
Second, serious vehicle pollution. China has become the fourth largest automobile
producer and third largest consumer in the world. In 2004, the vehicle volume in
China registered 27.42 million.
Third, aggravation of urban ecological imbalance. “City hot islands” and “city
deserts” have emerged. Natural ecological system in the cities have seen
degradation, which has further weakened the environmental affordability of urban
natural ecological system and has aggravated the conflicts between resources,
environmental supply and socioeconomic development of urban areas. While many
traditional urban environmental issues are not yet addressed, these emerging
environmental issues have posed new challenges to us and need appropriate
adjustment done by the Chinese government in its environmental protection work.
2.3.3. Measures of Urban Environmental Protection in China
The Chinese government attaches great importance to environmental protection and
has always been giving priority to promoting sustainable development of urban
ecological environment in its environmental protection work. As early as the
beginning of 1980s, the Chinese government has already made official
announcement, stipulating that environmental protection is the basic policy of the
State. With over 20 years’ of unremitting efforts ever since then, along with the
implementation of various effective measures, urban ecological environment in
China has basically maintained on a stable level, and the quality of ecological
environment in some cities has been improved remarkably.
Based on the analysis of urban environmental pollution and its causes, we can draw
a conclusion that: environmental protection in China’s urban areas should be
enhanced, and the following measures should be adopted:
First, to improve the regulation system for environmental protection and to
implement environmental protection in accordance with laws. The laws on
environmental protection such as Environmental Protection Law, Law on the
Prevention and Control of Atmospheric Pollution, Law on the Prevention of Water
Pollution, Law on the Prevention and Control of Environmental Noise Pollution,
and Law of Prevention and Control of Pollution Caused by Solid Waste should be
followed and implemented in a stringent manner. Meanwhile, environmental
35
impact assessment should be carried out seriously; environmental protection
facilities should be designed, constructed and put into operation simultaneously
along with that of the main body project. In this way, urban environmental
protection will gradually become law-based, thus, becoming more orderly and
regulated.
Second, to carry forward the System of “Mayor Accountable for Environmental
Protection”. The system of “Mayor Accountable for Environmental Protection” is
one of the 8 key administration systems regarding environmental protection in
China. Decision of the State Council on Several Issues Concerning Environmental
Protection (hereinafter referred to as “the Decision”), which was issued in August
1996, stressed in its first item that “the objectives for environmental protection
should be clearly set; administrative leaders should be accountable for
environmental quality, and the corresponding accountability system should be put
in place.” It also provided that government at various levels, in particular their main
leadership should perform the obligation of environmental protection in accordance
with laws. What was more, the Decision also pointed out: environmental quality
within each jurisdiction will be one of the key indicators to assess the government
leadership.
Various major environmental tasks and objectives within the tenure of government
should be identified clearly through implementing such accountability system and
through signing mayor’s accountability letter for environmental protection.
Meanwhile, environmental protection objectives of various relevant departments
and the responsibilities of major person-in-charge in fulfilling environmental
protection objectives should be identified. According to the provisions in the mayor
accountability letter for environmental protection, their performance should be
assessed on a regular basis, be made public and then be given with reward or
punishment.
Third, to build up systems for comprehensive treatment of urban Environment as
well as for quantitative assessment on the comprehensive treatment of urban
Environment.
The SEPA has begun to carry out quantitative assessment on comprehensive
treatment of urban environment (hereinafter referred to as “the urban assessment”)
in some key cities in China since 1989. The urban assessment is an environment
management system that aims to evaluate the performance and achievement made
by government at different levels in their comprehensive treatment of urban
environment, with a set of quantified indicators in the aspects of environmental
quality, pollution prevention and control, as well as environmental construction and
management. To be short, it is an assessment that targets at evaluating the
performance of urban government in environmental treatment.
36
Since 2002, the SEPA has started to issue Annual Report on Urban Environmental
Management and Comprehensive Treatment in China. The 2003 Annual Report
announced to the public the rankings of 113 key environmentally friendly cities, in
terms of comprehensive air pollution index. In 2004, as many as 500 cities in China
formally reported their results of “urban assessment”, accounting for 76% of the
total cities in China; the number of key environmentally friendly cities whose urban
assessment results were made public by the State increased from 47 in the past to
113 at present, meaning an increase of 66 cities; and such increase is the first of its
kind in history.
Fourth, to put in place city air quality reporting system.
In 1997, the weekly report for city air quality was issued for the first time in 13 key
cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing, Dalian and Xiamen. In 2000, the
daily report on air quality of 40 key cities nationwide began to be broadcast on
CCTV as well as published in major newspapers. So far, all the 113 key
environmentally friendly cities have put in place the air quality reporting system,
and have issued daily report on the results of urban pollution index, principal
pollutant, air quality grade and air quality status. In addition, some cities have
managed to made forecasts for the air and environment quality.
Fifth, to promote the program of choosing Environmentally Friendly Model Cities.
Since 1997, the SEPA has started to launch the program of “choosing
environmentally friendly model cities”. By 2004, SEPA has named 47
environmentally friendly model cities and 3 environmentally friendly model
districts. Among them, 10 were of sub-provincial level, 20 were of prefecture level,
17 were of county level, 3 were municipalities. Thus, the Jiaodong Penisula—
Weihai Model City agglomeration, Suzhou—Changzhou Model City agglomeration
in the Yangtze River Delta were formed. So far, these state environmentally
friendly model cities have all witnessed rapid economic growth, and their overall
strengths have been improved remarkably. Meanwhile, urban environment quality
has also been improved dramatically. The number of days that have air quality of
up to Grade 2 or better than Grade 2 covers over 80% of the whole year, which is
much better than the national average level. The city landscape waterways have
basically seen elimination of their black and smelly water. “Blue sky, clean water,
green land” as well as “peace, harmony” have already become major landmarks for
environmentally friendly model cities, and more cities are working hard to achieve
this.
37
3. Social Conflicts and Disputes in Chinese Cities as well as Their Outlooks of
Development
Another major area of sustainable development is to address the social conflicts and
disputes in Chinese cities, in order to achieve the harmony among human beings.
Social issues in the process of urbanization are very complex, including the issues
of education, employment, health care, social security, public security, poverty in
urban areas as well as the dual structure between the urban and rural areas. This
report mainly focuses on the analysis of urban poverty as well as the urban-rural
dual structure.
3.1. Urban Poverty
Urban poverty is a newly-emerged problem in the urbanization process in China.
And this issue is now becoming increasingly serious.
Urban poverty refers to the poor living conditions of citizens who are working and
living in cities. Poverty includes absolute poverty and relative poverty. Absolute
poverty means: the basic needs for survival are not fully satisfied, and the basic
food and clothing issues are not adequately addressed. Relative poverty refers to
the situation that the issues of adequate food and clothing have been addressed, but
the living conditions are not up to the basic subsistence that is widely recognized in
society. In the urban economics, 60% of urban average income is defined as the
threshold for low income, and 50% lower than this threshold is defined as poverty.
Poverty standards among Chinese cities vary greatly from one another. Generally
speaking, poverty is not a common phenomenon in urban areas; however, urban
poverty is on increase and shows potentials for further increase.
3.1.1. Rapid Growth of Poor Population in the Urban Areas
If we take the population who lives at minimum subsistence level as the poor
population, and calculate this part of people into statistics, then in 2004, there were
22.05 million poor people in urban areas of China. And the number of poor people
in urban areas shows a trend of steady increase, as shown in the Table Twelve.
Table Twelve: Changes in the Poor Population of Urban and Rural Areas in
China
From 2000 to 2004 (unit: ten thousand people)
38
3500
3209
3000 2927 2900
2820
2500 2610
2247 2205
2000 2065
1500
1171
1000
500 403
0
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004
农村贫困人口 城市贫困
Note: In the horizontal direction, from left to right: poor population in rural areas, poor population in urban
areas.
Table Twelve shows that the scales of poor urban and rural population have
changed in opposite directions and the number of poor population in rural areas has
decreased rapidly. In 1978, there were 250 million poor people in rural areas,
calculated by the poverty standard set by the government, and it accounted for
30.7% of the total rural population in China. In 2000, the number of poor
population in rural areas was lowered to 32.09 million, declining to 12.8% of the
previous figure and accounting for 4.0% of rural population of the year 2000. By
2004, the number of poor rural population in China was further reduced to 26.1
million and its percentage in the total rural population of the year was reduced to
3.4%.
However, while China has achieved tremendous progress in counter-poverty in
rural areas, urban poverty still keeps on increasing rapidly in terms of population.
The number of urban residents who live at subsistence level increased from 4.03
million in 2000 to 22.05 million in 2004, increasing by 4.5 times in four years’ time.
And the percentage of poor population in the total urban population increased from
0.88% in 2000 to 4.06% in 2004. That means, the percentage of poor population in
urban areas has exceeded the percentage of poor population in rural areas. What is
even worse, urban poverty tends to be increasingly serious.
3.1.2. The Definition of Poor Urban Population: including Both Poor Urban
Residents and Poor Migrant Population that Resides Permanently in Urban
Areas
It is worth noticing that the above-mentioned poor urban population only refers to
the poor urban residents who have urban residence permit. It does not include the
poor migrant population that permanently resides in urban areas. However, in the
5th National Population Census in 2000, the migrant population that resides
permanently in the rural areas was calculated into the total urban population.
Because of the low wages, poverty among rural migrant workers has become more
serious. If the poor migrant population that resides permanently in the rural areas is
also taken into consideration, then the urban poverty in China is actually even more
39
serious than it seems now. Under such circumstances, the government needs to
incorporate the figures (figures regarding the income and living situations) of this
part of population (the migrant population that resides permanently in urban areas)
into the overall urban statistics in a timely manner, so as to accurately reflect the
dynamics of urban development as well as its problems.
According to a random survey conducted by the author on the migrant population
that resides permanently in Beijing, out of 357 samples from 8 districts in Beijing,
59 belong to the group of poor population, accounting for 15.73% of total samples;
this percentage is much higher than 4.06%, which is the percentage of poor urban
population in the total population. Therefore, we can see that poverty among
migrant population that permanently resides in urban areas is a serious challenge in
front of China, which deserves undivided attention and bears no delay to be solved.
3.1.3. Living Conditions of Poor Urban Population-Case Study of Beijing
According to our survey, the basic situation of poor population in Beijing is as
follows: 73% of the these poor people earn a monthly income of less than 1000
Yuan; 51.3% have an education level of below junior high school; 51.4% are
unemployed or partly unemployed; only 18.9% of these poor people are satisfied or
basically satisfied with their living conditions; 47.9% consider they live a hard life
and think that they are faced with many difficulties that cannot be addressed on
their own. The survey also shows that these poor people generally have very
cramped living conditions: 48.9% live in the room with area of less than 30 square
meters; 50% live in unsanitary houses that lack independent sanitation facilities;
86.7% of them complain about the current affordable housing system; 62.5% are
not covered by any social insurance and actually these people are the main part of
Beijing residents who are uncovered by social insurance. In addition, 77.8% think
the costs for health care are way too high to afford; 45.2% express that their biggest
worry is about the price hike; 73% hope to receive technical and vocational training;
53.2% think that they are far from living a well-off life and are very pessimistic
about the future. (Ye Yumin, 2005)
3.1.4. Thoughts on Counter-poverty Measures among Urban Areas in China
China is in urgent need of building an urban counter-poverty system. The most
important solutions are proposed as follows:
① to build a balanced and quality 12-year basic education system, and to enhance
vocational training for the poor and low-income groups to improve the overall
competence of the poor residents, so that they can better compete in the labor
market;
② to adjust the industrial structure, so as to create more job opportunities and thus,
40
the impoverished population can have access to more financial resources;
③ to adjust affordable housing policy and low-price rental policy, including
lowering the price of affordable housing, expanding the service coverage of
low-price rental of houses; in this way, the quality of life among poor residents can
be remarkably improved.
In addition to the above-mentioned measures, it is equally crucial to build a sound
administration system targeting at the poor residents, in order to regulate daily
public services. Such a system includes two dimensions:
① It is necessary to build donation networks for the impoverished population, so
that these poor people can receive donations of various contents from various social
strata in various forms; it is equally necessary to distribute donations among the
poor population in a timely manner. Basically, the donations distributed include
food, clothing, bedding, daily necessities, stationary and so on.
Network building can base on the communities. Poor households should register in
their communities and provide detailed, necessary information at the time of
registration. In this way, the community can have knowledge of the number and
needs of these poor people. It is proposed that the registration should be updated
periodically, as the needs of different periods may vary quite much. Meanwhile,
communities should also be encouraged to receive daily donations from their own
members. Then the communities gather the things donated through various
channels and distribute them to the poor members of their own. If there are
outstanding donations, there will be another round of distribution within the whole
city. To sum up, the donation network should mobilize all kinds of social forces, in
order to regularly provide a large number of daily subsidies for the impoverished
family.
② More facilities of social services will to some extent be accessible to the
impoverished groups, so that the impoverished groups can have access to the
splendors of modern civilization. This can be carried out from two dimensions:
First, for those public service enterprises that operate for the entire year, such as
museums, parks and fine art museums, they can be required to open 1 to 2 days per
month free of charge, so as to provide opportunities for the impoverished groups to
enjoy modern cultural services.
Second, for those public services that specifically target at impoverished groups,
they should be asked to provide the following services, such as issuing certificates
for the impoverished groups (low-income households); places like parks, cinemas,
concert halls, swimming pools, fine art museums and amusement parks should be
required to provide public welfare services several times annually free of charge for
41
the impoverished groups.
3.2. Urban—Rural Dual Structure and the Coordination of Urban
and Rural Development
3.2.1. Alleviation of the Conflicts between Urban and Rural areas——the Key
for China in the Pursuit of Social Sustainable Development in the New Era
During the past two decades, the economic development in China has achieved
significant progress. However, in the process of such rapid economic development,
some social problems have cropped up. The core indication is the conflicts between
the urban development and rural development.
Over the years, China has implemented a system of “separate administration of
urban and rural areas, while focusing on the development of urban areas”. Cities
are the largest beneficiaries from this system, demonstrated by such facts as: rapid
wealth accumulations, great improvement in the basic infrastructures, remarkable
increase of the residents’ income as well as better quality of life. Despite this, it
must be admitted that urban development in China is to some extent achieved at the
cost of “putting rural development after”; this can be proved by the following facts:
the extreme shortage of infrastructures and public goods has reduced the basic life
quality of the rural residents; young and strong rural labor forces have flooded into
cities to earn a living, while women, children and elderly stay in the rural areas; on
the one hand, this has resulted in irrational rural labor structure, extensive
agricultural operation and tremendous wastes of land; on the other hand, when rural
areas has become an aging society much earlier than expected, 20 million
empty-nest children and nearly 20 million empty-nest elderly lack care and
affection from their family or relatives; this will inevitably lead to a series of social
problems.
The problems are mainly reflected by the widening gap between urban and rural
areas. First, the gap in industrial development and the gap between urban industrial
efficiency and rural industrial efficiency: in 2005, the efficiency of agricultural
sector was 6698 Yuan per person, the efficiency of secondary industry was 47650
Yuan per person, and the efficiency of tertiary industry was 30745 Yuan per person;
we can see the big gap here. The gap in industrial efficiency has determined the
income gap between urban and rural residents. In 2005, the per capita net income of
rural residents was 3200 Yuan, while the figure of urban residents exceeded 10000
Yuan. That is to say, the income of the rural residents was around one third of that
of the urban residents in 2005. However, back to the end of 1990s, the income of
rural residents was nearly 40% of that of the urban residents. That means, the
income gap between urban and rural areas has been widened and what is worse, the
42
gap still keeps on widening. It must be pointed out that there are more important
gaps, and unfortunately, they are very hard to be quantified, for instance, the huge
gap between urban and urban residents in their access to public services.
The increasingly widening gap between urban and rural areas has aggravated the
conflicts between urban and rural areas. It has led to serious social problems in the
rural areas, which in turn have led to the aggravation of a series of urban problems,
such as the increase of urban crimes, degradation of human settlement environment,
decline of urban affordability and so on. Ultimately, such a gap may become the
bottleneck in the overall development of China.
It can be seen that the traditional city-based development path has come to nowhere.
It is necessary for us to reform the development mode and management system, and
to incorporate rural development into the overall strategic framework for national
development, in the pursuit of coordinated development between urban and rural
areas. That can explain why the Chinese government has given the top priority to
the coordination between urban and rural development, among the five essential
tasks of coordination (the rest of the four “coordination” are: to coordinate and
balance development among regions, economic and social development,
development of man and nature, as well as domestic development and opening
wider to the outside world). Actually the coordination between urban and rural
development is the basis and precondition of promoting the rest of the four
“coordination”.
3.2.2. Substance of Coordinating Urban and Rural Development
Coordinating urban and rural development is proposed in view of the rigidity of
urban-rural dual structure as well as the importance of relationship between urban
and rural areas. The substance and fundamental objective of coordinating urban and
rural development is to play down the dual structure and narrow the gaps between
urban and rural areas. In this way, both urban and rural residents will become the
beneficiaries from development; thus, the urban—rural integration process will be
promoted and accelerated.
Specifically speaking, urban—rural integration mainly has three dimensions of
substance, namely:
① Economic substance: to promote the integration of urban and rural industrial
efficiency. Through agricultural modernization, agricultural efficiency will be
enhanced. The gap between agricultural efficiency in rural areas and efficiency of
manufacturing and service industry in urban areas will be gradually narrowed
down.
② Social substance: to narrow the urban-rural gap in industrial efficiency, so that
43
the income gap between urban and rural residents can also be narrowed.
③ Institutional substance: to provide equal public services (relative to urban areas)
for the vast number of rural residents, taking the opportunity of institutional
innovation. In this way, the gap in accessibility to public services between urban
and rural residents will be narrowed gradually.
In the process of urbanization in China, the issue of migrant population in big cities
still remains to be solved, therefore, there is another dimension to the substance of
urban-rural integration, that is: to narrow the gap between urban and rural
population within the urban areas, and to enable the migrant population to be truly
accommodated and integrated into urban life; in other word, this is the integration
of urban and rural population within cities. And this special dimension of substance
needs to be realized through system innovation and reform, in particular the reform
of the residence permit system.
3.2.3. The strategy to coordinate urban—rural development
We have proposed the four-dimension-strategy for the coordination of urban-rural
development in China:
First, taking the opportunity of the new type of industrialization, the government
should create more jobs, thus, providing larger space of development for the rural
surplus laborers. This is the basis for coordinating urban and rural development.
This dimension aims provide solutions to the reasonable transfer and
accommodation of the rural surplus laborers.
Second, the government should innovate and reform the urban residence permit
system, so that the migrant population and their family who migrate to urban areas
can become urban citizens in the real sense. This is the core content of coordinating
the urban and rural development. This dimension intends to address the issue of
how to retain the surplus laborers in the urban areas.
Third, the central government promotes the “three centralizations” (namely: the
concentration of industry to the central development regions; the concentration of
lands to their owners; the concentration of rural citizens to urban areas) in the
pursuit of economy of scale. This is the key to achieve the coordinated, effective
and orderly urban-rural development. This dimension intends to point out
directions for the flows of surplus laborers and rural population.
Fourth, it is fundamental to provide all-rounded and equal (relative to the urban
areas) public services to the agricultural sector and farmers; this is the foundation
for the coordinated urban-rural development. This dimension aims to create more
favorable conditions for the citizens who do not flow into urban areas but stay in
44
rural areas instead.
In order to realize the sustainability of the coordinated development between urban
and rural areas in China, the Chinese government needs to link and integrate these
four dimensions. It should also be noted that in coordinating development between
urban and rural areas, we should not just focus attention on addressing problems for
rural areas; instead, we should incorporate into the framework urban development
and population migration system between urban and rural areas.
3.2.4. The Establishment of Trial Areas for Comprehensive Reform to
Coordinate Urban-Rural Development——A Milestone for the Promotion of
Social Transformation in China
On June 7th 2007, National Development and Reform Commission issued Notice on
Approving the Establishment of National Comprehensive Reform Trial Areas that
Coordinates Urban—Rural Development in Chongqing and Chengdu (hereinafter
referred to as “the Notice”). The Notice points out: Chengdu and Chongqing should
try to base on their realities and carry out institutional reform in various fields in
accordance with the needs of trial areas; to make pioneering breakthroughs in key
areas and to innovate courageously so as to put in place as soon as possible the
system and mechanisms that are conducive to the coordination of urban-rural
development; to promote coordinated socio-economic development between urban
and rural areas, thus, setting good examples in promoting and deepening reform in
China.
This is the first of its kind ever in China to establish trial areas for comprehensive
and supportive reform that targets at coordinating the urban and rural development.
It also signifies the efforts made by the Chinese government in promoting social
transformation.
Actually, as early as 2003, Chengdu has started to make unremitting explorations to
achieve more integrated development between urban and rural areas. It has made
sound progress and the initial success in this aspect. The success story of Chengdu
has fully demonstrated that the government can play an important role in
coordinating the urban—rural development. If the government works hard to make
up for the market deficiency, functional absence and shortcomings resulted from
history, then it is possible to put in place a sound governance framework and policy
system within a short period of time. In the long run, such framework and system
can be beneficial to the coordination between urban and rural development. It can
also ensure equal public services be provided to the rural areas, and the quality of
life among rural residents be improved significantly. In this way, the interactive and
orderly development between urban and rural areas can take initial shape.
45
Concluding Remarks
China is a large developing economy that is growing rapidly. In the process of
economic development, it is inevitably faced with a series of environmental
problems. However, China adopts an objective attitude towards these problems and
takes a positive outlook on this issue. Meanwhile, it is trying every possible means
to address these environmental problems in pursuit of sustainable development, so
as to fulfill its commitments to the international community.
Since the environmental problems in China have emerged amid development, they
should be addressed amid development accordingly in a viable way.
Actually, China has already gained worldwide recognition for its unremitting
efforts devoted to the sustainable development. Its devotion has also received
supportive and cooperative responses from many major international organizations
and countries. It should be noted that China, as the largest developing nation, is still
in the midst of industrialization, which is often realized at the cost of high resources
consumption and serious pollution. But once this stage is finished, the burdens on
the environment and resources will be reduced as a result. In addition, we have also
witnessed ever-increasing international cooperation and exchanges, as well as the
long-term efforts by the Chinese government and people. Therefore we have good
reasons to believe that China will surely address its problems in the environment
and resources and will ultimately run on a faster, better track for development.
Notes and References：
The Path of Urbanization in China: Financial support and Institutional Innovation,
by Ye Yumin, 2000, Commercial Printing Press, Beijing.
China’s Urbanization and Sustainable Development, by Ye Yumin, 2007, Science
Publishing House, Beijing.
Survey on the Life Quality of Beijing Residents, by Ye Yumin, 2005,Research Paper
on the Review of Overall Urban Planning and Outlook for Beijing: 2004-2020.
Study on the Features of Migrant Population in China as well as the Urbanization
Policy, by YeYumin, 2004; Academic Periodical of Renmin University 200(42)： ～
75
82.
46
Report on the Sustainable Report Strategy in China 2005, by the Task Force on the
Research of Sustainable Development Strategy in China Science Academy, 2005,
Science Publishing House, Beijing.
Towards Sustainable Development: Urbanization Strategy During the Tenth
Five-year Plan, by Yu Shiyang, 2000; from China Investment 2000(7)：23～27.
Ecological Pressure and Development: Some Concepts in Sustainable Development,
by Tao Zaipu, 2003, Economic Science Publishing House, Beijing.
Rural Education in the Urbanization Process, by Tao Hua Kun, from the
Collections of Excellent Academic Papers in the 19th Urbanization Seminar in
Hangzhou, 2004.
Study on the Urbanization Strategy in China, by Liu Yong, 2004, Economic
Science Publishing House, Beijing.
Study on the Changes of Water Resources Affordability and Its Driving Forces, by
Meng Fande and Wang Xiaoyan, 2006-02-01.
Sustainable Development and Urbanization, by Niu Fengrui, 2005-09-05, from the
Finance.
Choice of Urbanization Path and Sustainable Development, by Pei Chen, from
Shanghai Comprehensive Economics 2002(4)：43～45.
Social Security for the Land-losing Farmers in the Urbanization Process, by Song
Bin.
The State of Environment in China: 1990-2006, State Environmental Protection
Administration.
OECD Science, Technology, and Industry Outlook 2002, OECD, Paris: OECD,
2002.
47
