Jiangsu intensifies efforts to improve people's livelihood

2021-01-18 15:18:00

The Standing Committee of the 13th Jiangsu Provincial People's Congress held a joint meeting on January 14 to review projects designated to improve people’s livelihood by the provincial government.

Before the review, the meeting heard a report on the project progress in last year. Despite the serious imbalance between revenue and expenditure, Jiangsu managed to ensure an increase of fund to safeguard people's livelihood, with most of general public budget expenditure invested in fields related to people's livelihood, a trend that has continued for three years in a row.

Gao Xiaoping, deputy director of the Social Construction Committee of the Jiangsu Provincial People's Congress, said the province has increased the basic pension for retirees and the minimum basic old-age pension for rural and non-working urban residents for nine consecutive years, including a rise of 1.415 billion yuan in medical subsidies than the year before.

In addition, the province's expenditure for serious disease insurance reimbursement also increased by 1.36 billion yuan over the same period last year, and the per capita amount of reimbursement reached 8,253 yuan, an increase of 30.8 percent.

Photo taken May 26, 2020 shows power supply staff renovating power lines in an old neighborhood in Hai'an of Nantong city, Jiangsu province. [Photo/CFP]

The report said some projects already made progress over the schedule. Zhu Tiejun, deputy director of the Environment, Resources and Urban Construction Committee of the standing committee, said the province had completed renovation of 775 old neighborhoods by the end of December, far higher than the planned number of 500. Jiangsu also renovated 152,100 urban shantytowns and 177 farmers' markets, both well beyond the original goals. Implementation of the projects has won general support and recognition in the meeting.

Li Kanzhen, director of the Jiangsu Provincial Development and Reform Commission, said the province has planned 52 projects in 15 categories for this year to continue the improvement of people’s livelihood. Such initiatives involve education, health, employment and entrepreneurship, public services and food safety.