PROTECTING CONSUMERS: A man in Shenyang, Liaoning Province, learns about his rights during an activity on March 15 (XINHUA)

Working for Better Rights

March 15, the World Consumer Rights Day, has passed again. Topics including complaints and protecting consumers' rights are being talked about everywhere. Various activities have been held to mark the day. Consumers' associations are stepping up protection, aiming at typical cases. Vendors are also sparing no efforts to show their honesty to consumers. In addition, many netizens are posting their stories of difficulties in protecting their rights. They have hopes of discussing the issues with deputies to the National People's Congress.

Certainly, March 15 every year gives us a good opportunity to promote better protection of consumers' rights, and assemble all kinds of opinions and suggestions to tackle violations. Nevertheless, it is a long-term mission to protect consumers' rights. All the problems cannot be resolved in one day. Therefore, it needs more than just setting March 15 as an outlet for consumer discontent.

The upsurge in consumers' complaints on March 15 shows consumers' dependence on this day. It also shows other problems. First, the consumers' sense of protecting their rights is still weak. Second, official departments usually do not resolve complaints promptly and effectively.

Protection of consumers' rights not only needs a day set aside for it, but also needs the setting up of a sound legal system of complaints and enforcement, and the improving of relations between consumers and sellers.

Yanzhao Evening News

Exposing Public Expenditure

This year, China's Ministry of Finance will publish the general situation about the use of the central fiscal budget on officials' cars, public-relation expenditure and overseas visits, and related central departments and institutions should make their use of fiscal budget on these items open to the public in detail, said the ministry's spokesperson on March 8.

The government needs to be supervised by the public, not only on how it executes its power, but also on how it spends money. Why does the expenditure on these items stay high despite various criticisms? The most important reason is taxpayers do not have effective supervisory tools or channels.

Now, the Ministry of Finance and the central departments have decided to publish the relevant information, a positive response to the public and also a good start. We believe that a series of strict regulations on the expenditure of these items will follow and any departments that refuse to make their expenditure open or report false statistics will be punished. If governments at various levels do publish their expenditure on these items, they will win greater public trust.

Xinmin Evening News

Easing Population Control

China's population control departments are considering relaxing control over the one-child policy, said Wang Yuqing, Deputy Director of the Population, Resources and Environment Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, recently. But the timetable is still unknown, he said.

Ji Baocheng, President of China Renmin University and also a deputy to the National People's Congress, says he believes it's urgent to relax control on childbirth. China's natural population growth rate is only 5 per thousand and the pace has been retained for 20 years. Without immediate adjustment, serious imbalances in population structure will crop up. In the near future, China's ageing population—above 60 years old—will soon reach 30 percent, and the proportion of the labor force—from 28 to 40—will drop by half during the next decade. By then the huge pension expenses will pose a big challenge to the government.

China's family planning policy has been operating for three decades and many problems are emerging. People gradually found that this policy has neglected the problems caused by imbalanced population structure and people's psychological necessity, such as close relationships ensured by blood bonds. It has also been discovered education of an only child is more difficult than that of two or more children together. A child with siblings knows better about how to cooperate and compete and they tend to be less selfish. Besides, when an only child marries, it means every couple has to support not only their child but four parents.

There is the worry relaxing the controls will incur problems, such as swelling of population. But experience in some pilot areas, such as places in Gansu and Shanxi provinces where the one-child policy has been relaxed, shows such worry is uncalled for. The childbirth rates in these places have maintained low. Besides, the childbirth rate in some big cities, such as Beijing and Shanghai, has been declining.

The solutions to population problems will not be found immediately or easily. We need a more prudent and scientific attitude toward this matter.

Guangzhou Daily

Achieving Education Targets

As early as 1993, an education reform and development outline of China clearly pointed out that by the late 1990s, the proportion of education input to GDP would be raised to 4 percent. It's a pity—even by now—the target is still far away. In recent years, increasing education input has been a hot topic in the country.

The proportion of education input to GDP is one of the important indexes to measure a country's input in eduction. Research shows when per-capita GDP reaches $800 to $1,000, education input should at least account for 4.07 to 4.25 percent of GDP. China's per-capita GDP has now exceeded $1,000, but the proportion is only 3.28 percent, lower than the world's average of 5.1 percent and even the 4.1 percent rate of developing countries.

Governments at various levels should share responsibilities. Many countries already have clear legal regulations about this responsibility. But in China, there is no similar laws or regulations to ensure the input proportion of governments at different levels. For example, provincial governments' revenues account for a big share of the national revenue, but there is no clear regulation stipulating the proportion that provincial governments should shoulder.

Eighteen years have passed since the proportion increase was proposed in the outline. How long do we have to wait to achieve this target? It's time to set up an effective compulsory education input safeguarding system, and the Central Government and provincial governments should take greater responsibility in fighting for the 4 percent target.

Yangcheng Evening News