Chinanews, Beijing, Feb. 1 – The Ministry of Finance says that it will allocate 9.2 billion yuan this year to pay for tuition and fees for primary and middle school students in rural areas in the spring semester, and to guarantee education welfare service.
In 2006, the Ministry of Finance waived the tuition and fees of primary and middle school students in rural areas in the western region, in response to the State Council's requirement for setting up a compulsory education scheme for students in rural areas. The newly allocated fund is a continuation of such move. With this fund, all the 148 million primary and middle school students in China’s rural areas can receive compulsory education. In addition, the central government will allocate some special fund to improve education welfare services.
In order to guarantee that all primary and middle schools will begin the spring semester as scheduled, the Ministry of Finance recently allocated 9.2 billion yuan to 27 provinces (autonomous regions, and municipalities), 3 cities with economic planning directly supervised by the State Council, and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. Among the 9.2 billion yuan, 7.5 billion yuan will be used to pay for students’ tuition and fees and 1.7 billion yuan to guarantee education welfare service.
The Ministry of Finance requires that local governments at various levels act in compliance with the demand of the State Council by appropriating such funds really to various schools, so that the funds are used as they are supposed to.