First Sino-Japanese project on rural old age insurance launched

A Sino-Japanese project on rural old age insurance was launched in Beijing Wednesday in a bid to introduce more expertise and vision into China's rural social security reform.

Jiang Mohui, Deputy Director General with the Ministry of Labour and Social Security (MOLSS)'s international cooperation department, said that Japan has encountered problems in its urbanization similar to those haunting China now, and that both countries are populous with scarce land resources.

"Thus Japan can offer more credible experience and lessons for China than Western developed countries," Jiang said.

With approval from both governments, the project has undergone intense negotiation and preparation by MOLSS and the Japan International Cooperation Agency.

In the next three years, team members including experts from both sides will conduct field surveys and policy research, propose and test feasible models in eight selected cities, counties or districts in seven provinces and municipalities in China, including Beijing, Shandong and Anhui Province.

Osada Mamoru, head of the project's Japanese team, said the eight pilot regions have incorporated both affluent areas like Daxing District in suburban Beijing and barren areas like Nanhua County in southwest China's Yunnan Province.

"With regions with varied economic backgrounds in the package, the project may get a panorama of China's vast rural areas, which is conducive to brewing a more applicable mechanism of old age insurance for China's farmers," Osada said.

China's rural families have, traditionally, functioned well in providing for the aged. However, this function is diminishing because of the increasingly greying rural areas and the large-scale rural labor migration to the urban areas, as well as land seizures from farmers in urbanization.

China tried to address the issue in late 1980s and early 1990s, and conducted pilot reform in the rural old age insurance system in several areas. Progress has been made, problems including an unsound fund management system and inadequate training of professionals remain.

Shinichi Nishimiya, minister of the Japanese embassy in Beijing, said: "The rural population is aging faster than the urbanites. The rural old age insurance system has a direct impact on the life quality of the aged, This project is significant for both Japan and China."

Source: Xinhua