Photo: BGNES/EPA
Thousands of delegates gathered at China’s most important political meeting this week to vie for Beijing’s attention on a range of unusual proposals, ranging from rethinking the weekend to offering free education as an incentive for parents to have more children.
Many of the more outlandish or far-reaching proposals are unlikely to become law. Instead, they are an opportunity for participants to go beyond their duties and offer their own solutions to China’s socio-economic problems.
“It’s an opportunity for a delegate to stand out and be noticed, especially if they’re bringing up an issue that’s becoming increasingly topical,” said Anthony Saich, director of the Rajavali Foundation’s Asia Institute and professor of international affairs at the School of Government. “John Kennedy” at Harvard University.
This enables actors to influence policy. Here are some of the proposals this year at the conference, an advisory body that sits concurrently with China’s parliament:
Waiver of the two-day weekend
One of the controversial proposals by Delegate Xiong Shuilong, representative of Guangdong Province, will completely change the working week as we know it. He is pushing for the country to replace the traditional two-day weekend with one that alternates between a six-day and a four-day work week.
According to Xiong, the Saturday-Sunday system is not conducive to domestic tourism, as people tend to reserve long trips for the limited number of weekly public holidays in China. The change will increase the number of three-day weekends people will be willing to travel, even if it means they have to take a day off on Wednesdays.
The proposal has already backfired. Many users of China’s Twitter-like service Weibo greeted the proposal with cynicism, saying they already had to work on weekends. “I’ll thank heaven if we introduce two-day weekends first,” wrote one.
“Forest food” as a demand engine
Proposals to revive the national economy abound at the meeting, given the importance that consumption is expected to play in the recovery of the economy.
One idea is to create a national plan for the development of so-called “forest foods”, or edible products such as honey and fruits that are found or produced in the forest. It is believed that these products are not dependent on traditional agriculture and thus represent an alternative way to increase food supply.
Reversing the declining birth rate
Several proposals attempt to halt China’s population decline, with particular emphasis on ways to boost the birth rate, an issue that, as Harvard’s Saich notes, has been a focus of President Xi Jinping’s attention.
One of the proposals envisages stimulating births by offering free education from kindergarten to university for the third child in the family. The government is easing birth limits after decades of allowing couples to have just one child, but the population continues to decline.
Another delegate pointed to the rising cost of engagement gifts as a possible reason for the decline in the number of couples tying the knot and suggested discouraging the practice of offering gifts such as jewelry and other items to brides’ families by subsidizing wedding expenses for those , who choose to avoid this practice, which sometimes serves as a dowry.
The inspection of textbooks and rules for learning Chinese
A popular nationalist blogger and delegate is trying to come out this year after proposing a new rule to seek public feedback on the content of textbooks before they are published.
Zhou Xiaoping – who catapulted to fame in 2014 after Xi praised the “positive energy” in his patriotic essays – unveiled his plan after a public outcry last year over illustrations in a set of primary school textbooks. The projects were criticized as ugly, pornographic and racist.
He also proposed requiring foreigners who want to work or study in China to pass a Chinese language proficiency test before being allowed to apply.
More analysis of Bloomberg TV Bulgaria website
