Senior Chinese official calls for getting rid of unhealthy social practice

China will focus on improving the supervision mechanism for checking some unhealthy social trends this year, Chinese State Councilor Hua Jianmin said at a recent national conference.

Hua, who is also secretary-general of the State Council, made the remarks at a national conference on eradicating unhealthy social practices, which was held in Shijiazhuang, capital of north China's Hebei Province, between March 24 and 25.

He said supervision will be strengthened to ensure the funds and the preferential policies for farmers to be fulfilled so as to alleviate the burden of farmers, and the practices which harm the interests of farmers should be corrected.

Measures will be taken to crack down on commercial briberies, especially on the practice of taking kickbacks in selling textbooks and medicines, said Hua.

Those government officials who abuse their power for personal gains and take bribes will be punished severely, Hua said.

China will strengthen efforts to rectify unauthorized collection of school charges and make public allowable fees in a bid to ease the burden of students.

The country will strive to standardize medical charges, strengthen supervision over pricing of medicine and medical services to make the majority of people afford medical cost, he said.

Hua called on relevant departments to attack violations of environmental protection rules such as discharge of pollutants by some enterprises.

China will also focus on building a clean government and cultivating honest and incorruptible officials, Hua concluded.

Source: Xinhua