We will continue to give priority to developing education. This year we will formulate the Outline of the National Medium- and Long-Term Program for Education Reform and Development to make comprehensive arrangements for education reform and development in China through 2020. This year, we need to focus on the following five areas.

First, we will promote fairness in education. We will implement free compulsory education policies for both urban and rural areas well. We will increase public expenditures on rural compulsory education to 300 yuan per primary school student and 500 yuan per junior secondary school student. We will progressively ensure that children of rural migrant workers have access to free compulsory education in the places where their families have relocated. We will increase living allowances for rural students receiving compulsory education who come from poor families and stay in school dormitories. We will strive to basically clear the debts incurred in providing nine-year compulsory education in rural areas within three years. We will improve the national financial aid system for students and increase financial aid for secondary vocational school and university students from poor families to ensure that everyone enjoys equal opportunity to receive education and that no child is denied schooling due to financial difficulties.

Second, we will optimize the education structure. We will energetically develop vocational education, with the focus on supporting rural secondary vocational education. We will gradually make secondary vocational education free, beginning this year with rural students from poor families and students studying agriculture-related subjects. We will continue to improve the quality of higher education, develop high-quality universities and key disciplines, and guide institutions of higher learning to adapt their specialties, curriculums and courses to meet the needs of the market and China's economic and social development.

Third, we will improve the quality of teachers. We will apply a performance-based salary system for teachers in compulsory education and raise salaries for the 12 million primary and secondary school teachers. The central government will spend 12 billion yuan and local governments will also increase funding for this purpose. We will step up training for all teachers, especially rural teachers, and encourage graduates from teachers colleges and other colleges and universities to teach at community and village schools.

Fourth, we will advance well-rounded education. Education of all types and at all levels must focus on promoting all-round development of students. Reform of curriculums, textbooks, teaching methods and examination and evaluation systems should be accelerated to relieve primary and secondary school students of their excessive study load so that they will have more time to think, practice and create.

Fifth, we will implement a program to ensure that all primary and secondary school buildings are safe and promote standardization in the construction of rural primary and secondary schools. We will make school buildings places that are the safest and provide the greatest assurance to parents.

We will carry forward pharmaceutical and health care reform and development. We will ensure that public medical and health care services serve the public good and fully arouse the initiative of health workers. We will work hard to establish a nationwide basic medical and health care system for both urban and rural areas to begin providing universal coverage. We will focus on the following five areas starting from this year.

First, we will develop a system that ensures basic medical care. Urban residents will be covered by basic medical insurance for urban workers or basic medical insurance for non-working urban residents, and rural residents will be covered by the new type of rural cooperative medical care system. We will ensure that these programs cover over 90 percent of those eligible within three years. The Central Government will provide appropriate subsidies for retirees from closed or bankrupt state-owned enterprises in financially strained regions to get such insurance. We will continue to raise the standard for financing and increase government subsidies for basic medical insurance for non-working urban residents and the new type of rural cooperative medical care system, appropriately expand the scope of reimbursement and raise the proportion of costs reimbursed. We will improve urban and rural medical assistance programs and improve the level of assistance.

Second, we will establish a national system for basic drugs. This year, we will formulate and promulgate a unified national basic drugs catalog and adopt policies concerning their production, distribution, pricing, use and insurance reimbursement in order to ease the burden on patients for the cost of basic drugs.