SENIORS EMBRACING END-OF-LIFE PLANNING
A growing number of people are organizing their own funerals, as Cao Chen reports from Shanghai.
Despite the Chinese tradition that topics related to death are taboo, Zhu Shanchang has already arranged his funeral service and cemetery allocation.
“I’ve ordered multiple services, including burial caskets, urns, flowers and other cremation receptacles and memorial items, by signing a preneed funeral and burial contract with a funeral service company last year,” the 82-year-old Shanghai resident said.
Zhu made the decision after he caught a bad cold a few years ago, and coughed heavily and constantly for a long time. It took more than two weeks for him to recover properly, despite taking medication regularly.
“After that, I started to wonder where my body would lie after death,” he said. “I would not go back to my hometown in Shaoxing, Zhejiang province, because no family members are there. Equally, I don’t want to trouble my son and daughter-in-law in Shanghai when my time comes.”
Knowing their father’s concern, last year, Zhu’s son and daughter-in-law found the preneed funeral and burial service, which is provided by Fu Shou Yuan, a well-known
funeral company.
“I feel at ease after ordering all the personalized services by myself, I deliberately chose a cemetery near my children’s home to make it convenient if they want to visit.”
For Zhu, it’s not taboo to manage his funeral and burial service ahead of time, “but a part of one’s life-planning for the future”.
Certainly, he is not the only person in China who has accepted this concept of postdeath care via a preneed funeral and burial contract.
According to statistics supplied by Fu Shou Yuan, more than 1,600 people in China have signed similar contracts with the company since it introduced the service in 2015.
Moreover, 1,174 of those contracts were signed after the company completed its pilot program in Hefei, capital of Anhui province, last year. It officially launched the service in 16 locations, including Chongqing and the provinces of Shandong and Jiangsu. More than 500 of those who have signed up are from Shanghai.
“The service provides elderly people with the opportunity to design every detail of the funeral and burial process themselves, such as the shape or material of urns or styles of clothing,” said Zhao Xiaohu, manager of the Shanghai branch of Fu Shou Yuan.
“It’s a combination of tradition and new service experiences.”
According to Zhao, there is no time limit to the contract.
“Customers can choose different packages at the price of 6,800, 12,800 or 21,800 yuan ($1,100/$2,000/$3,470), based on their financial situation,” he said.
“No extra money will be charged, regardless of any objective reasons in the future, including inflation and currency devaluation, once the contract has been signed.”
He Kaili, a Shanghai resident, has just bought the service for her 68-year-old father.
Having overseen her mother’s funeral a few weeks ago, the 38-year-old decided to sign the contract for her father to ease his burden.
“It was a tiring process, like mental and physical torture, to manage my mother’s funeral and burial, while enduring the pain of losing her,” she said. “The contract (for her father) is such a relief, especially for an only child like me. It’s like insurance for the elderly, the same as other financial products, except one only receives the benefits after death.”
Early stages
Xing Weidong, assistant of the manager at the business division of Fu Shou Yuan, said that although the popularization of the contract is still in the early stages in China, the practice has a history of more than 60 years overseas.
“More than 70 percent of Japanese people have accept- ed the contracts, and the percentage in the US is even higher, reaching 90 percent,” Xing said.
For example, in 2014, preneed sales of funerals and cemetery plots generated revenue of $822 million and $688 million respectively at Service Corporation International, a provider of funeral and cemetery services headquartered in Texas, United States, according to its 2015 financial report.
Despite traditional considerations, attitudes toward death are changing as China becomes more open and developed.
A white paper published this month by the China Will Registration Center shows that a rising number of Chinese seniors are recognizing the importance of writing wills while they are physically and mentally healthy to avoid disputes and to simplify inheritance procedures.
More than 82,000 people ages 60 and older have written and stored their wills at the center, free of charge.
“Perceptions are gradually being transformed as more people discuss death and care with their families or with friends, and then seek professional help,” Xing said.
“The preneed funeral and burial contract has been introduced just in time as a proper education about death.”
Data from Fu Shou Yuan reveals that most contracts have been bought by people born in the 1970s and ’80s for their parents after discussion, and they account for more than 90 percent of the company’s consumers nationwide.
“People in their 30’s and 40’s are the exact generations born under the one-child policy in China, which means the burden of taking care of their children and four or more elderly people falls on just one couple,” Xing said. “They are in urgent need of assistance from us.”
The company’s other customers are usually seniors ages 75 to 80 who are purchasing services for themselves or their spouses.
“It illustrates the Chinese pursuit of a unique, high-quality life both before and after death. It’s our mission to help them design a nice farewell to this world,” Xing said.
“China’s population is aging, so demand will definitely rise.”
Aging population
According to data from the Ministry of Civil Affairs, China was home to more than 22 million registered residents age 60 and older in 2015, accounting for more than 16 percent of the population. Moreover, more than 143 million people were age 65 and older, 10.5 percent of the total.
However, despite being faced with a large, promising market, the country’s funeral and burial industry is still stuck at a point where supply cannot meet demand, Xing said.
“Most services lack strict management of sufficient infrastructure, strict regulation and fair pricing. The practitioners are usually individuals, and the choice of products offered to customers is limited,” he added.
“The national provisions should be reformed to standardize and supervise the related services.”
Zhao Yu, manager of Fu Shou Yuan’s business division, said ensuring security of capital is a tough challenge.
“At Fu Shou Yuan, the revenue from contract services is held separately in the accounts of each branch in different cities,” he said.
“To leverage its security, the company will create a unified, managed account especially for preneed funeral and burial contracts at the headquarters in Shanghai. We will also cooperate with trust institutions and banks to provide standardized management and supervision.”
Wang Hongjie, vice-president of the China Funeral Federation, has been quoted in thepaper.com as saying promotion and publicity related to the preneed service is crucial for the industry’s growth.
In 2011, for example, the Shanghai Funeral and Interment Service Center launched a preneed service contract program for elderly people in the city who have no children to take care of them, but only about 10 people have signed the contracts.
“The public is still the key factor to promoting this kind of service,” Wang said.
The service provides elderly people with the opportunity to design every detail of the funeral and burial process themselves.”
Zhao Xiaohu, manager of the Shanghai branch of Fu Shou Yuan