Address on current economy

We are also working on a contingency mechanism. During the current stage, both poverty relief and contingency measures are important. Poverty reduction stands out as an important part of China's achievements in the past few decades. Lifting several hundred million people out of poverty is an accomplishment that no one can deny. But we are yet to establish a full-fledged contingency mechanism. There should be a safety net in the society that meets people's basic living needs so that people don't have to be concerned about social security when they look for jobs or start up businesses. This is to make sure that when one encounters difficulty in seeking employment and starting business and cannot support himself, there is a safety net that he can fall back on. Yet a basic safety net is not enough. He should also have the last resort to turn to, which is the contingency mechanism. I believe "heart-warming" activities should be part of this contingency mechanism. Everyone, including the government, society and trade unions that carry out "heart-warming" activities, charity organizations and others, should all get involved to build this contingency mechanism. We should promote social harmony by resolutely preventing frequent occurrence of incidents that push the limit of public tolerance.

Third, we need to ensure that workers' income will increase along with the growth of the economy and productivity. Social security should remove misgivings, but social security alone is not enough. There is the issue of workers' income. The Twelfth Five-year Plan calls for doubling workers' income in step with GDP growth. Workers' income should grow along with growth of the economy and productivity.

Of course, what is on top of our mind is ordinary workers. The average minimum wage was raised by 18% in 24 provinces and municipalities directly under the Central Government this year, which has put pressure on enterprises and affected their export competitiveness. But we have to make this hard choice because ultimately, our goal is to achieve common prosperity for the people. Rural migrant workers are also very much on our mind. I am so happy to learn that one million rural migrant workers have joined trade unions. They have made huge contribution to cities, and cities can't do without them. A big city cannot function without various services. We need both surgeons and waiters, for instance. We should respect people of all professions. There are 260 million rural migrant workers in China. Some of them are doing seasonal and transient work. The government and trade unions should take actions to help them settle down in cities and enable them to enjoy what they do, and become truly integrated into urban life and enjoy their due rights.

Here, I want to stress in particular that Party committees and governments at all levels must attach great importance to the work of trade unions. In particular, we should provide more care for model workers, and support and help trade unions in their work related to model workers. A country must have a strong driving force and model workers are pace-setters we should emulate. Model workers are from all walks of life, and they are champions in their professions, and all the people should be like them. We should also improve the mechanism of joint meetings between the government and trade unions. As this mechanism is already in place, we must make it work. This mechanism will enable us to learn more about what workers, especially ordinary workers, want. We also need to promote democratic management of enterprises and make employees' representative conference play its due role.

Fourth, we should attach great importance to enhancing employee training. People used to say that China has a demographic dividend, but actually we also have a dividend of qualified personnel, which is something that should not be underestimated. In order to upgrade the Chinese economy, we should not only release the biggest dividends of reform, but also turn demographic dividend into dividend of qualified personnel. We have made some progress in this area. Of all urban employees, 36% are skilled workers with a quarter of them being highly skilled ones. While this is not a small number, we still lag far behind developed countries in this regard. Currently, the government provides funding for training 10 million employees every year. This is not a small number either, but still it is not big enough as there are several hundred million employees in China. We must spend more money on employee training and give greater policy priority to employee education to turn demographic dividend into dividend of qualified personnel. We should support trade unions in carrying out skill training programs for employees to turn the overwhelming majority of employees into skilled employees and equip majority of them with intermediate to advanced level skills. This will spark motivation and creativity of employees and I am fully confident we can reach our goal.

We must also take workplace safety very seriously. Workplace safety is of paramount importance as it is about protecting human lives. We should never drop our guard. The Party and government have always attached great importance to workplace safety and we have also made a lot of efforts in this area in recent years. Yet there are still many problems. Enterprises alone cannot ensure workplace safety, and the government must intensify supervision. The public and trade unions should also play their role of supervision.

In conclusion, I wish the 16th National Congress of Chinese Trade Unions a full success!

(China Daily 11/15/2013 page8)