RESPECT LIFE: The new draft of the Food Safety Law means consumers' health and food safety are now more heavily emphasized than ever before

China's new draft Food Safety Law has been published by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, the country's top legislature, for public discussion. According to the draft, producers of substandard food products face fines, with the highest amount being 10 or even 20 times the food's price.

For years, China only had a food hygiene law to regulate issues of food safety, but it no longer meets the current needs. The formulation of the Food Safety Law shows that lawmakers have begun to treat poor quality food not only as a hygiene problem, but more importantly as a safety problem as well.

Food hygiene and food safety concern public health, so the compensation to victims and the penalty on substandard food makers should not be casually based on the food price alone. It's unfair for a victim to receive a compensation of 30 yuan ($4.3) in a case where a 3-yuan ($0.43) loaf of bread makes him severely sick. Such a penalty seems unable to deter the maker.

Many countries are very rigorous and critical in the enforcing of food safety laws. The formulation of the Food Safety Law is a big step forward in China, but the new law is expected to place more emphasis on the value of life.

The Beijing News

Hukou Hype Prevails

According to a joint survey by China Youth Daily and Tencent.com, 77.1 percent of young graduates demand a job that will offer them a Beijing hukou (permit to live, work and receive social benefits in Beijing) and 67.8 percent believe that only when the minimum annual salary reaches 100,000 yuan ($14,300) can the loss resulting from the lack of Beijing hukou be made up. Close to 15 percent believe the bottom line should be at least 200,000 yuan ($28,600).

This survey undoubtedly shows that hukou remains a very important factor in the job- hunting process. Why does hukou, a product of the planned economic system, still matter so much today? The graduates' passion for a Beijing hukou is not groundless, as it means a lot of welfare benefits such as education resources, housing fund, medical insurance and endowment insurance, which are exclusive to Beijing hukou holders. In China, the bigger the city is, the more welfare and special resources there are behind hukou.

Hukou, because of its attached welfare benefits, tends to prevent the free movement of talent from one city to another. If graduates put hukou as their first priority, regardless of their true interest and ambition, it will curb this country's creativity and flexibility.

Guangzhou Daily

Perverse Privilege

In south China's Shenzhen City, children of senior executives in the finance industry enjoy the privilege of a 10-point bonus toward the senior high school admission examination. The local education authorities have been practicing this for many years.

Favorable scoring policies are not strange to Chinese citizens, as the country has long been offering bonus points to children of national heroes and students from ethnic minority groups who sit for admission examinations for schools of various levels. However, the state has never granted Shenzhen the right to grant this privilege.

Why do children of financial executives need special care? Giving the bonus points depends on local education and finance authorities, in the way that financial institutions apply to the Municipal Office of Financial Work and the latter will decide on the candidates. This treatment is allegedly offered to only five or six students a year. Thus, it's suspected to be a privilege for local dignitaries.

To adopt this favorable scoring policy for the senior high school entrance examination is likely to exert a negative influence on locals, especially the children, who realize that some students are there not for their ability, but because of their parents' status. Ordinary children thus come to see inequality in education at an early age.

Oriental Morning Post

Price Increase Panacea?

Despite the rising price of coal, the government-set electricity rates remain unchanged and thus in the first quarter of 2008, four of China's five power generation groups saw huge losses for the first time. These companies are reportedly proposing price hikes to make up for the losses.

Since it is the first time that the power generators have faced huge losses, does it mean that they have always been well protected by the government's favorable policies in the past years? Why do state-owned power companies always turn to the state for price increase policies? Why can't they try to bear the pain of growing up on their own?

Although China's electrical power generators are equipped with advanced technologies almost at the same level as those in developed countries, the line loss rate in China is 2 percent-2.5 percent higher than that in the West, equal to a loss of 45 billion kwh of electric power. Why don't coal-fired power plants first learn to improve their technological and managerial abilities before they propose to raise prices?

To raise any prices related to the public's basic livelihood is a sensitive issue. No one wants the big salaries and welfare benefits of power company executives to be based on random price increases.

Sanqin Metropolis Daily