ROAD SAFETY: A policewoman teaches students about traffic signals in Hefei, Anhui Province, on December 2, China's Traffic Safety Day (DU YU)

City Categories

In a plan released on December 3, the Chinese Government has identified 262 cities as being dependent on natural resources, in a bid to roll out targeted measures to boost their development.

The plan, which is the first national framework on sustainable development for resource-dependent cities, puts the regions into four categories based on their resource sustainability: growing, mature, declining or regenerative.

Yunnan, Liaoning and Henan are the three provinces with the highest concentration of such cities.

Central authorities will extend fiscal and policy support to facilitate restructuring and upgrading efforts, including accelerating shanty town renovation and boosting employment, according to the plan.

Outstanding Students

Shanghai was ranked first in mathematics, science and reading in a report on global education released every three years.

Sixty-five countries and regions took part in the tests for the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Its PISA report (Program for International Student Assessment) is the single largest study of global schooling.

The study is highly influential, with participating countries and regions representing more than 80 percent of the global economy and often adapting policy in response to the findings.

The first PISA survey was carried out in 2000, with Shanghai joining the rankings in 2009 and coming first in the same three categories that year as well as first overall.

Around 6,400 students from 155 schools in Shanghai took part in the latest assessment in April last year. Globally, around half a million 15-year-olds took part. The tests are based on a 1,000-point scale.

Zhang Minxuan, leader of the Shanghai PISA program and President of Shanghai Normal University, attributed Shanghai's students' performance in mathematics to more chances to learn the subject, ability and family backgrounds.

Shanghai students also reported an average of 13.8 hours every week doing school assignments, the highest and almost three times the average 4.9 hours.

Emergency Center

A national emergency broadcast center opened in China on December 3, as the country looks to speed up the construction of a nationwide radio network for transmitting rescue and relief information in disaster-hit regions.

Under China National Radio (CNR), the China National Emergency Broadcasting Center is responsible for setting up an emergency broadcast system and building a radio network that links central authorities to community-level offices.

The plan, which marks an important step toward better coping with disasters, was inspired by a similar but smaller-scale radio network set up after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake that hit Lushan, in southwest China's Sichuan Province, on April 20.

The radio service, initiated by CNR in conjunction with local radio and TV stations, will broadcast government relief measures and secondary warnings to disaster-stricken areas via loudspeakers, AM radio frequencies and satellite facilities.