How to make citizens permanent residents in name and nature

Chinese cities planning to expand in scale should rethink their approach. Besides creating jobs to attract newcomers, they will also have to invest much more in housing, education and healthcare.

A document issued by the State Council, China's Cabinet, earlier this year made it clear that all city governments are obliged to provide basic public services — including education, housing, social security, and medical care — to all permanent residents who have not formally registered their household registration (hukou) in the place where they live.

In China, permanent residents traditionally referred to people who had hukou in the place of their birth. But thanks to millions of farmers migrating to the cities in search of jobs in the past decades, permanent residents can even include those who might have their hukou elsewhere but have been living, working and studying in a particular city. Of late, such numbers have been rising rapidly, as millions of university graduates get jobs in big cities where they don't have a local hukou.

It is estimated that nearly half of the residents in cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen have their hukou elsewhere.

China had been an agricultural society for thousands of years. Until 50 years ago when I was young, about 70 percent of the country's population lived and worked in rural areas.

Today, it is the opposite. Under the household registration system, people used to be registered in their place of birth and relied on the local government there for social welfare benefits.

That system made human mobility difficult, if not impossible. But with the gradual elimination of the ration system in the late 1980s, millions of farmers left home for higher-paying jobs in the cities.

It is estimated that about 300 million former farmers and their families now live and work in cities other than the ones where they have their hukou.

But despite living, working and studying in the cities for years, they and their families remain "farmers from outside the city". In the absence of local hukou, they have been denied the benefits of many welfare projects, such as low-rent housing, seats in public schools, urban medical insurance and other benefits that residents with hukou take for granted.

Transferring hukou from their hometowns to the cities they live in now remains a difficult task. China is promoting urbanization and many cities, in order to grow in population size and influence, are working hard to attract migrant workers from other regions. However, the migrants are not being welcomed unconditionally.

Some tier-1 cities offer hukou only to those who are young, have at least a bachelor's degree or hold stable professional jobs. Smaller cities are willing to accept those who purchase houses or run businesses in the area.

As for those who don't have a good educational background and/or substantial money, a point-based household registration system has been adopted. Under this system, applicants for hukou can keep accumulating points on the basis of duration of stay, taxes paid, investments made and professional positions held until they have enough points to obtain a local hukou.

For years, there have been suggestions to do away with the hukou system. But apparently the central authorities have decided to take a more cautious approach. The hukou system has been in place for a long time and a hasty withdrawal may lead to consequences we are not prepared for.

To make their environment more migrant-friendly, many cities have taken their own measures to help migrants settle down.

Social security and medical insurance now cover more permanent residents, including those who don't yet have a local hukou. Local public schools are offering more seats to migrants' children.

The new State Council document can be regarded as a nod in this direction and requires local governments to do more. When making future development plans, urban planners will have to increase the supply of low-rent housing not only for the disadvantaged groups with local hukou but also for the permanent residents without hukou.

The cities may have to build more kindergartens, public schools and other facilities for children of these new residents.

According to the document, all permanent residents, with or without local hukou, should be treated equally with regard to housing, job opportunities, poverty relief, education, social security, medical care and access to public services.

Once all these requirements are effectively met, hukou would become less important and permanent residents would become permanent residents both in name and nature.

The author is former deputy editor-in-chief of China Daily.

kangbing@chinadaily.com.cn