Focus on key tasks

Efforts set to continue to bolster laws pertaining to welfare of elderly, rural vitalization and agricultural development

In the lead up to the Two Sessions — the annual meetings of the National People’s Congress and the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference — the country’s biggest annual political event, China Daily is publishing a series of stories on how national legislators and political advisers perform their duties.

China’s legislature has over the past few years accelerated the creation of legislation aimed at promoting the welfare of the elderly and boosting high-quality rural development in a bid to bolster protection and respond to a rapidly aging population while strengthening agricultural development.

The latest National Bureau of Statistics data showed that by the end of last year, China’s population aged 60 and above exceeded 280 million, making up 19.8 percent of the national total.

The National Health Commission estimates that this figure will grow to over 400 million by 2035, accounting for more than 30 percent of the total, meaning that China’s population will have entered a stage of severe aging.

To tackle this issue and offer older people a better living environment, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, the country’s top legislature, amended the Law on the Protection of the Rights and Interests of the Elderly in 2018.

While requiring the country to provide aid, including for living and healthcare costs for the elderly in financial difficulty, the revised law stipulated that geriatric medical research should be accelerated.

It called for expedited efforts to optimize nursing care, and encouraged measures to help improve the quality of life for the elderly by providing more sporting, cultural and entertainment activities for them.

To create an aging-friendly society, the NPC Standing Committee also began reviewing a new draft law on accessible facilities last year.

It clarifies the responsibilities and duties of every party involved, including those for building and design, and requires local government agencies to plan to renovate barrier-free facilities and rebuild them.

He Yiting, an official from the NPC’s Social Development Affairs Committee, highlighted the importance of the law while explaining the draft to lawmakers, adding that more of the elderly and disabled stood to benefit further from the legislation.

Upholding a people-centered approach, He said the draft specified what services should be provided and where accessible facilities needed to be built. For example, it stated that barrier-free access should be advanced to more areas, including mobile phone applications, telecoms and libraries.

Given that many victims of fraud are elderly, the law on telecom and online fraud, which took effect in December, requires government departments and relevant service providers to help enhance awareness among the elderly, to stop them from being cheated.

Overall protection was strengthened after the top legislature made doing so a priority in the country’s first Civil Code, which came into force in 2021.

Protection

Local legislative bodies have also stepped up efforts to protect the rights and interests of the elderly in recent years.

In Nanchang, Jiangxi province, a regulation promoting nursing care at home came into effect in January 2020, which requires government agencies to provide public and medical services through the establishment of a long-term home nursing service for the elderly with disabilities.

The legislature in Qingdao, Shandong province, has boosted protection for seniors through a local regulation ordering public nursing services to provide beds to those without income or children.

The legislators also have stepped up efforts in promoting laws concerning rural vitalization and food safety over the past five years to provide a stronger legal basis for driving highquality agricultural development and maintaining State security.

After about three years of research and frequent reviews of drafts, the law on the promotion of rural vitalization was passed by the Standing Committee of the National People’s

Congress, the country’s top legislative body, in April 2021. Two months later, the law came into effect.

Before the adoption, the NPC’s Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee, which created the law, solicited opinions on various aspects of agriculture, including rural industrial growth and villagers’ livelihoods, from many walks of life to ensure public voices could be heard.

As a fundamental and comprehensive law on agriculture, the 74-article document calls for maintaining a vigorous market in rural areas while increasing incomes and living standards of rural residents.

It highlights the importance of talent support, environmental protection and urban-rural integration, and also requires more care and better services to be given to left-behind children, women and old people in rural areas.

To guarantee the implementation of the law, the committee invited seven NPC deputies and officials from grassroots departments to attend a seminar in May 2021, encouraging them to help popularize and explain the new law to rural residents, said He Baoyu, an official from the NPC’s Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee.

While promoting rural vitalization with legislation, the committee has also put grain safety as a top priority, formulating and revising laws in the past five years.

To carry out the central leadership’s requirements and respond to concerns from deputies, the committee accelerated making a law on black soil in March 2021, aiming to urgently and fully protect the soil that contains a high percentage of humus, phosphorus and ammonia and can produce high agricultural yield with its high moisture storage capacity.

After the draft was reviewed by the NPC Standing Committee three times, it became a law in June 2022 and took effect two months later.

Meanwhile, the committee also played a leading role in amending the Seed Law. The revised law, which was passed in November 2021 and came into effect in March last year, provides more support for innovating and protecting new varieties of plants, with harsher punishments against infringers in this regard.

Moreover, the formulation of a law to guarantee grain safety is in progress. A few issues, including reducing food losses, enhancing food reserves and protecting food facilities, have all been discussed among lawmakers during the draft-making period, said Zhang Fugui, an official from the NPC’s Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee, adding that major suggestions have been put into a draft of the law.

Since 2018, the committee has also intensified inspections on legal implementation, such as those on fisheries, quality of agricultural products and animal husbandry, to check whether the laws worked effectively and what needed to be further improved, Zhang said.

Upholding a peoplecentered approach, the new draft law on accessible facilities specified what services should be provided and where such facilities needed to be built. HE YITING

An official from the NPC’s Social Development Affairs Committee