The Rural Survey Team of Social Economy under the National Bureau of Statistics released "2004 Monitoring Report on Achieving the Rural Well-off Society in China in An All-Round Way'', reports Gu Chongyang, a reporter with the People's Daily on April 21. The report shows 21.6 per cent of the rural areas in China achieved the goal of a relative comfortable life by the end of 2004, up 4.7 percentage points over the previous year.

The goal of achieving a well-off society in the rural areas was measured by the following six indexes: the social development, population quality, life quality, democracy and legal system, and resources environment. Of which the quality of life for farmers to achieve a well-off life in an all-round way accounted for 28.7 per cent of the requirement. Influenced by the big rise of grain prices the Engle's coefficient index for rural residents was back to 47.2 per cent from 45.6 per cent. The proportions of the rural social development and democracy and legal system for realizing a well-off life in an all-round way in rural areas were reached 33.1 per cent and 69.0 per cent of the requirement respectively, up 6.3 and 13.7 percentage points respectively over the year before thanks to more state financial support for public services in the rural areas. However, the progresses for the population quality and resources environment in the rural areas were comparatively slower than other indexes. It is negative for the resources environment since the country's arable land was reduced by 0.7 per cent in 2004 than the previous year. Among the 18 indexes measuring the well-off life in the rural areas the indexes were lower in the areas of the proportion of the first industrial labor force, per capital disposable income for farmers, rural pension and cooperative medical services.

The report shows the proportions of rural overall well-to-do life in Shanghai, Beijing and Tianjin surpassed 60 per cent. As a whole the gap of the rural overall well-to-do levels in the rural areas between the west and the east and central areas was narrowed while the gap between the central part and the east areas was widened. The overall well-to-do levels of the western region lagged behind the eastern areas at least 10 years and about 5 years behind the central part areas.

According to the monitoring report analysis, efforts should be made to solve the following difficult and key issues in building overall well-to-do life in the rural areas in the future: sustainable increase of farmers' income, further development of the rural society, improving the quality of the rural population, arable land protection, economizing agricultural water and achieving the goal of the overall well-to-do life in the rural areas of the western areas.

By People's Daily Online