Civil societies get government boost

"We have tried about 100 times in the past 13 years since I founded the organization but failed time and time again as we cannot find a regulator to be affiliated with," she said, adding that her organization faces challenges to earn public trust and a tax exemption without a legal identity.

"It's significant that the central government has realized the importance of giving more space for NGOs to grow and let them take over some responsibilities," said Deng Guosheng, an expert specializing in NGO studies at Tsinghua University in Beijing.

He urged civil affairs authorities to provide financial investment, training programs and other forms of support to improve NGOs' capabilities.

"At the same time, the government should also perfect the evaluation mechanism for NGOs' performance to prevent the waste of resources," he said.

Li said the ministry will ensure that fundraising and other operations of social organizations will be under closer watch.

The government will also work harder to facilitate public supervision of social organizations by setting up an information platform, where the general public and media can check registration details, results of annual inspections and evaluations of social organizations, he said.

Grassroots democracy

About 600 million people in rural China will participate in direct elections for village committees by the end of 2013, said Jiang Li, vice-minister of civil affairs, responding to a question on Wednesday about China's grassroots democracy.

There are 589,000 village committees in the mainland's rural areas, of which 98 percent are directly elected, she said.

She stressed that the direct election of a new village committee in Wukan village, Guangdong province, last March was not an exceptional case in China.

About 400 villagers in Wukan rallied to protest against illegal land seizures in late 2011, and months later they voted to select their new leaders after the intervention of the provincial government.

However, media reported that thorny issues, including land use rights, remain unsolved after the election of a new village committee in Wukan.

Jiang said the protest was due to economic disputes, and the newly elected village committee should solve the remaining problems by engaging all local farmers in the decision-making process.

Contact the writers at hedan@chinadaily.com.cn