A CHINESE WEEKLY OF NEWS AND VIEWS February 23, 1987 -Minister on Student Unrest Courtyard of o Farm House. Photo hy Yang Guilin Riding motorcycles to fetch their brides. Photo hy Zhang Ruizcng fa I. ^v.;ml Beijing"-^ HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK VOL. 30, NO. 8 FEB 23. 1987 CONTENTS NOTES FROM THE EDITORS 4 Greeting International Housing Year p. 31 EVENTSARENDS 5-9 P- 14 Light Industry Urged to -.t Boost Export Special Report on Campus Unrest Afforestation; More Trees Planted China's IBM Stone's Ambition • (1) In an exclusive interview with Beijing Review, one of Firecrackers Dash Firemen's China's leading education officials explains the relationship Hope for Easy between the recent student unrest and the trend of bourgeois Spring Holiday liberalization which he sees as having run unchecked for the last China's Stand on Parties* few years. He also spells oyt government policies towards Conference students involved in the turmoil (p. 14). Weekly Chronicle (Feb. 9-15) (2) An analysis of the progress and problems of China's higher education and the strengths and weaknesses of present- INTERNATIONAL 10-13 day university students (p. 21). St>ulh Pacific: Nuclear I'rec Zone (3) A chronicle of the student demonstrations (p. 17). Treaty Pigeonholed China Signs 1 vvo Protocols Japan: Diet Smitten With Multilateral Asian-Pacific Party Meeting Declared Dissension Ecuadtir: Kidnapping Troubles the • A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman declared that ;f;\v,vPr8si£fe^t conditions are not yet ripe for a multilateral meeting of - Canada.'USA: Cobbled Free communist and workers' parties. The most pressing issue today Trade Talks is for all parties concerned to take concrete actions to remove Cuba: Austeritv Measures in the '"hot spots" in the region, he stressed (p. 8). OtTing Obstacles to South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Interview With China's Top Educator: Campus Unrest: Result of 'Liborallzation' 14 • Washington's refusal to sign the three protocols for the Chronicle of Events: South Pacific nuclear free zone pushes the prospect of nuclear Student Upheaval: What's demilitarization there much further away (p. 10). It Ail About? 17 University Students and Higher Education 21 Contributions to the lYSH FROIVI THE CHINESE PRESS 26-27 • During the current UN-sponsored International Year of BUSINESS/TRADE 28-29 Shelter for the Homeless, the Chinese government plans to CULTURE/SCIENCE 30-33 build 150 million square metres of housing in urban areas and 600 million square metres in the countryside. It has set goals to COVER: Vicc-Ministcr He Dongchang the year 2000 and measures to ensure their realization. To of the Slate Education Commission. provide adequate housing for a billion people will be no small Wu Jiadu contribution to the world's efforts(p. 4). ;|:|5|iMSp;M^f(ol Office Tel: 893860 Subscfiption (jrlces C yeor); USA US$23.00 Stglish Pepgrfrnen) Tph 890951-5.46 Ausfratitt A.$22.00 Canada Can.$2).00 Distributed fay Ctilno tnternationsi Book 24 (5ci:iAO"7!>uang Rood, Bo'jing Troding Cofporofion (GUOJI SHUDIAN) New ZMlond NZ.$30.QO UK £12.00 • NOTES FROM THE EDITORS Greeting International Housing Year by Xin Lin he United Nations has desig• has built large quantities of laid-out house which will basically Tnated 1987 as the International housing for urban dwellers. Large- meet the farmers' living and Year of Shelter for the Homeless. scale housing construction began production needs. Its aim is to call the society's after the 1970s, of all housing According to the China Com• attention to the lack of adequate space, those completed in the mittee for the International Year housing and urge governments of 1980s accounted for 36 percent; in of Shelter, the government will all countries to make renewed the 1970s, 32 percent; only 9 adopt the following measures in efforts to solve the problem. The percent was built before 1949. order to achieve the above goal: People's Republic of China has Compared with 1978, in 1985 • Changing the low-rent sy• actively responded to this call. investment in urban housing stem under which all urban construction increased nearly 8 workers' housing is provided by This year, China plans to build times, housing area completed the state. China will try to absorb 150 million square metres of rose more than 4 fold, averaging a more private funds for housing housing (more than 2.7 million 22.26 percent increase a year. construction and increase the flats) in urban areas and 600 Rural houses were built with proportion of housing expendin million square metres in the funds raised by the farmers ture in individual consumptibmi countryside. The nation will see 50 themselves. Compared with 1978, (now it accounts for only 3" million people move into new in 1985 investment grew more percent), so as to quickly solve the homes. According to a general than 10 times, averaging an housing problem. survey conducted in 1985, a annual growth of 32.05 percent. • Effectively controlling the quarter of the Chinese people still The first thing a well-off farmer growth of urban population. lack adequate housing. Construc• wants to do usually is to build a China will strictly limit the scale of tion of new houses will ease this new house. The number of new big cities, reasonably develop shortage. houses is increasing in the medium-sized cities and actively countryside and the standard of expand small cities and towns, so It is indeed a tremendous task to housing construction is rising with as to avoid housing and other provide adequate housing for a most houses constructed with problems brought about by billion people. In old China, a bricks, tiles and sometimes overly-large cities. handful of high-ranking officials reinforced concrete. The number • Keeping housing standards and landlords and big capitalists of old-type mud and thatched huts under control. The emphasis of lived in sumptuous private homes is decreasing. The average amount urban housing construction will and spacious courtyards, of living space for farmers is be on small and medium-sized Western-style houses with gardens conspicuously larger than that for flats to suit family structures or big apartment buildings, urban dwellers. tending to become smaller. whereas the majority of people As a developing country, • Encouraging the building of had to make do in ramshackle China's economic power is still apartment houses to meet the houses, some of the more poverty- very limited. Although housing urgent needs of newlyweds. stricken having no shelters at all. area has expanded greatly, • Encouraging the purchase Since the founding of the standards of housing are still very and construction of houses by People's Republic in 1949, this low. Quite a number of people live individuals. great disparity has disappeared. In in crowded quarters, while • Developing low-cost build• terms of property rights, 84 housing facilities and the availa• ing materials. percent of urban housing is bility of private flats are still far • Stressing the transformation publicly owned; in terms of from meeting people's demand. of old residential quarters and old housing area, the flats or houses Steady, long-term efforts are still residences. Efforts will be made to the government provides to necessary to improve people's improve their infrastructures, the officials at the ministerial level are living conditions. The government environment and interior only twice or three times larger has paid great attention to this and facilities. than those for ordinary staff has set the goal for the year 2000: Improving living conditions members and workers. Each household in most cities and and solving the housing problem Over the last 30 years or more, towns will have an economical and for a billion people will indeed be although the state has not been in livable flat and each rural family, a no small contribution to the easy economic circumstances, it practical, hygienic and compactly world. • 4 BE1.I1NG REVIEW, NO. 8 • EVENTSARENDS ••^MMBHBBMMMMMMMHM Light Industry Urged to Boost Export ith the growth in the world few years, the country has problems include drabness, W economy, China's light in• depended on its light industry for limited variety, poor quality and dustry is faced with challenges as about 20 percent of its foreign outdatedness, the conference was well as opportunities. To meet the exchange earnings and 35 percent told. challenges and take advantages of of its consumer goods. "The light To tackle these problems and the opportunities, China must and textile industries are, in my make light industrial products expand the exports of manu• view, the most promising export more competitive in the internat• factured goods so as to earn as sectors. They can make full use of ional market. Minister of Light much hard currency as possible. the country's natural resources," Industry Yang Bo, also present at "This is a major strategy for said Hao. the conference, announced that vitalizing China's light ins.iustry," Hao told the conference that the ministry will develop some said Hao Jianxiu, member of the light industry has witnessed a 36.8- 6,000 new varieties of textile Chinese Communist Party Central fold increase in the past 37 years products to replace 20 percent of Committee Secretariat and a since the founding of New the existing ones in the years 1987- model worker in the 50s, at a China — an average annual 90, with emphasis on developing national conference on light growth of 10.5 percent in terms of new products in the areas of industry which opened on Feb• output value — while the state has furniture, cooking utensils, small ruary 8. invested a total of 27 billion yuan household electrical appliances, electronic toys and cosmetics.