The charitable cause in China continues to be a direct beneficiary of the country's rapidly growing economy.

According to the 2006 China Philanthropy List issued by hurun.net, from 2003 to 2006, the country's Top 50 enterprises and entrepreneurs donated almost 5.1 billion yuan (about US$638 million) to charitable causes in many areas including education, social welfare, public health, and accident and disaster relief.

Charity as a concept is increasingly being recognized as an effective means of achieving some balance in wealth distribution. According to a recent survey, 71.9 percent of the respondents believe it is the obligation and responsibility of everyone to contribute to the public welfare system, with 78.7 percent saying that they had taken part in charitable activities at least once before.

The survey, which interviewed 5,000 people, was jointly conducted by China Youth Daily's Social Investigation Center, tencent.com, and sina.com.

However, the survey also revealed that confidence in charity organizations and their efficacy is low.

Some 70.8 percent of the respondents said they would prefer to participating in activities organized by their own companies or units; 67.6 percent said they would rather make donations to people raising funds on the streets; 54.7 percent choose instead to buy charity lotteries or bonds; and a further 28.6 percent said they donate blood. Only 21.5 percent of respondents would voluntarily take part in activities conducted by social organizations or foundations.

Corruption is a major concern for potential donors. The current lack of adequate regulations or system of supervision of charitable organizations offers no guarantee of the proper use of donations.

Experts like Professor Xia Ye from Peking University therefore urge that the public be given access to any relevant information concerning their donations, through the Internet, for example.

Statistics from the Ministry of Civil Affairs released on January 17 showed that in 2006, governments at all levels received more than 3.52 billion yuan (US$44 million) in funds, 58.037 million pieces of clothing and bed-linen, and other materials worth 540 million yuan (US$67.5 million). The number of beneficiaries was about 19.224 million person-times. At the end of 2006, 1,138 charity funds had been established, representing an increase of 13.9 percent from 2005.

Professor Deng Shengguo, director of the NGO Research Center under the School of Public Policy and Management at Tsinghua University, said that charity through social organizations is the way to go for charity in these modern times.

The key obstacles to an efficient charity system in China are corruption and a lack of supervision, and the government itself, according to him.

He explained that participation in a charitable cause is a voluntary act, not one in response to an administrative command.

Yang Tuan, deputy director of the Social Policy Research Center at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, echoed Prof. Deng's view. Analyzing the survey results, he pointed out that 29 percent of the respondents were actually ordered to donate part of their salaries to charity, and this gives rise to another problem.

"Chinese people want to help one another, but don't know how," Yang lamented.

(China.org.cn by Wang Ke, January 23, 2007)