The gap between China’s west and the relatively prosperous eastern areas is enlarging partially because of the imbalance of well-educated and trained personnel, a national survey conducted last year warned.

The western areas include the provinces of Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, Guizhou, Sichuan and Yunnan, and the autonomous regions of Ningxia Hui, Xinjiang Uygur, Tibet, Guangxi Zhuang and Inner Mongolia, and the Chongqing Municipality.

In western China’s interior provinces of Shaanxi, Gansu, Ningxia, Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou and Xinjiang Uygur and Tibet autonomous regions, and Chongqing Municipality, only 161 “trained experts and professionals” were found for every 10,000 people working in state-run enterprises and institutions.

The number is lower than the 206 per 10,000 in eastern China and is 30 percent below the national average even with non-state employees taken into account.

Workers with advanced high-tech knowledge were particularly scarce in the west, the survey said.

At least 80 percent of trained people and professionals in Qinghai and Gansu provinces live in the provincial capitals with few working in smaller cities or rural areas.

About 85 percent of the total are working for state-owned enterprises and institutions while about 80 percent of trained people in western China are concentrated in government agencies and institutions, 20 percent higher than the national average.

Of those working in institutions, over 60 percent are professionals engaged in education and medical services. Only 18 percent work as agricultural technicians or engineers.

The proportion of professionals and engineers with advanced degrees account for only 3.5 percent, 2 percent lower than the average.

Of those with senior professional degrees, 70 to 80 percent are older than 55 years with only 18 percent below 45 years.

The survey also revealed that, among western professionals, only 3 percent continued their education beyond junior colleges, about 3 percent lower than in eastern China. Many lacked the ability to adapt due to outdated knowledge, according to the survey.

There has been a general exodus of trained personnel from western regions due to the hardships of the living and working environment, the survey said.

In Xinjiang alone, some 40,000 professionals transferred to work outside the autonomous region from 1979-98 while only 7,250 talented workers moved to the area.

The survey cited poor working and living conditions as main reasons for the departures.

While lacking senior professionals with up-to-date knowledge, there has been an excess of ordinary technicians educated in secondary technical schools in western regions.

(China Daily 02/05/2001)