China must improve its social security system and develop welfare and charity projects to better help the people with the most need, a political adviser has proposed.

Zheng Silin, former minister of labor and social security, said the ever-increasing gap between the rich and the poor has kept the needy from sharing in the fruits of the system's development in the past few years.

"China remains in a comparatively low level of social security development compared with developed countries," Zheng said during the fourth plenary session of the 10th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC).

About 700 billion yuan (US$86 billion) was earmarked as social security funds last year, according to official statistics. The system includes social insurance, welfare, the special care and placement system, social relief and housing services.

As the core of the social security system, social insurance comprises old-age insurance, unemployment insurance, health insurance, work-related injury insurance and maternity insurance.

"Limited funding, narrow coverage, lack of basic policy analysis and a poorly coordinated administrative system have been hindering the nation's social security development," Zheng said recently.

In east China's Anhui Province, for example, more than 5 million people should benefit from social security services, of whom 80 percent are farmers, Zheng said.

Social security should mainly target the needy, including laid-off workers, farmers with lower incomes, disabled people unable to work and senior urban residents.

Zheng, serving as a member of the CPPCC for the first time, told the story of how he met about 70 laid-off miners who came to him one winter day and asked for help with getting heat.

"I was deeply moved and shocked as they could not even afford the heating service, and it came to my mind how much more we still have to do in terms of building a sustainable and effective social security system to help the needy," Zheng said.

As a result, Zheng said that special items for different groups of people, such as migrant workers, lower-income farmers and disaster victims should be set up as part of efforts to build a more sound social security system.

Zheng also called for more social welfare and charity projects to be launched for the needy.

"Social welfare and charity projects from non-governmental sectors are also a must to help the needy," he said. "It's not the responsibility of the rich but something relevant to everybody."

After he retired last year, Zheng launched a charitable foundation to assist needy students from families of laid-off workers and miners to get access to schools.

At present, only four well-known non-governmental charity organizations run projects to give financial support to students: the China Charity Federation, the Red Cross Society of China, the Hope Project and the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation.

Official statistics show that about 30 million Chinese rural residents are considered to be living in poverty, and another 30 million are laid-off workers. Others are disabled and need financial support from the system.

But China has only about 100 charity organizations, and official statistics show that the funds they collected last year amounted to 0.1 percent of the nation's gross domestic product.

China's civil affairs departments raised donations totaling 2.9 billion yuan (US$357 million), and charity organizations collected about 3-4 billion yuan (US$369 million-493 million) last year.

(China Daily March 9, 2006)