The press conference on the State Council’s guideline on reform of China's household registration system

(en.nhfpc.gov.cn)

Updated: 2014-08-24

Liu Limin: The third policy is the tuition exemption in vocational schools. Since 2009, the Ministry of Finance, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Education, and the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security jointly implemented the tuition exemption policy, and have been expanding coverage. By 2012, 90 percent of students in vocational schools have benefited from the policy. This year, 19 provinces have expanded the policy coverage to all students at vocational schools. That is to say, the vocational education for migrant workers’ children is free in most provinces in the country. 2014-07-30 11:00:41

Liu Limin: The fourth measure is to urge migrant workers’ children to take entrance exams in inflow cities. You may have noticed that the General Office of the State Council communicated the No 46 document in August 2012. Following that document, 27 provinces have published policies to allow migrant workers’ children to take the local high school entrance exam, and 30 provinces published policies to allow them to take the college entrance exam. In 2014, 28 provinces started to solve the problem of migrant workers’ children taking part in the college entrance exam in an inflow city, or what we call the “cross-province gaokao.” In this year alone, 56,000 qualified children of migrant workers went through application procedures. 2014-07-30 11:01:52

Liu Limin: In line with the guideline that Vice-Minister Huang briefed to you just now, we will carry out work in four aspects in the next move.

First, as the guideline stipulated, the Ministry of Education will guide local education authorities to include migrant workers’ children into the regional education development plan.

Second, in terms of budget subsidy, the subsidy should be allocated in accordance with the number of migrant workers’ children at school. Just now Vice-Minister Wang Bao’an mentioned this issue too. We will also increase the special reward for schools receiving migrant workers’ children.

Third, we will give different guidance to different cities, make sure that the enrollment policies of migrant workers’ children are reasonable, and guarantee their equal access to education.

Fourth, we will strengthen management by continuing to improve our national primary and secondary school students’ school record management system. This system covers all students in compulsory education and high school education, including migrant workers’ children. Each student is given an unchangeable number in the system. As a result, the system enables us to grasp dynamic information comprehensively, timely and accurately. Now we are clear about the exact number of students receiving compulsory education, and the number of migrant workers’ children among them. We will improve our education service for migrant workers’ children via this system. Thank you. 2014-07-30 11:04:29

Wang Pei’an: Thank you for your attention to the health and family planning public services for the transferred agricultural population. To answer this question, I will start with briefing the situation of the urban community health service institutions. The community health service institutions play a fundamental role in the urban health and family planning service system. In large and medium-sized cities, the government deploys one community health service center for every 30,000 to 100,000 people, or maps out health service centers in line with the jurisdictions of sub-district offices. Community health service stations are distributed according to needs. By the end of 2013, there were 8,488 community health service centers and 25,500 community health service stations nationwide, and 476,000 medical staff working for these health service centers and stations. We have initially completed the community health service system to service all permanent resident populations, including the transferred agricultural population and other inhabitants. 2014-07-30 11:08:28

Wang Pei’an: In terms of medical service, we have put the transferred agricultural population and other inhabitants into the coverage of disease prevention and control. According to the Law on the Prevention and Treatment of Infectious Diseases, we implemented localized management on infectious disease control, which means the local health authorities are in charge of the prevention and control of infectious diseases among the population, either registered or non-registered, in their jurisdictions. According to the National Immunization Program, all children of certain ages can get vaccinated for free. 2014-07-30 11:10:33