High quality promotion of people-oriented new urbanization

The Decision on Further Comprehensively Deepening Reform and Promoting Chinese path to modernization (hereinafter referred to as the "Decision"), which was deliberated and passed at the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, made an important deployment for "improving the system and mechanism of integrated urban and rural development", of which the first task is to "improve the system and mechanism of promoting new urbanization". In July 2024, the State Council issued the "Five Year Action Plan for Deepening the Implementation of the People oriented New Urbanization Strategy" (hereinafter referred to as the "Five Year Action Plan"), which deployed the overall requirements, key tasks, policy measures, and organizational implementation for promoting the construction of new urbanization in the next five years. The high-quality promotion of people-oriented new urbanization can promote high-quality development through economic growth, improving people's livelihood, etc., and inject strong endogenous power into the promotion of Chinese path to modernization

1. Promoting a people-centered new urbanization is an important part of achieving Chinese style modernization.

General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized that in the process of modernization, how to handle the relationship between workers and peasants, as well as urban-rural relations, to a certain extent determines the success or failure of modernization.. The Decision emphasizes that the integrated development of urban and rural areas is an inevitable requirement of Chinese path to modernization. Promote new urbanization, accelerate the urbanization of agricultural transfer population, and enable farmers who have the conditions to enter the city to enter smoothly and with peace of mind. Promoting the people-oriented new urbanization is not only the internal requirement of accelerating the integrated development of urban and rural areas, but also an important part of achieving Chinese path to modernization

Promoting a people-oriented new urbanization is an important way to solve the "three rural issues". The most arduous and heavy task in comprehensively building a socialist modernized country still lies in rural areas. To do a good job in the work of agriculture, rural areas, and farmers in the new era, it is necessary to deploy and promote it as a whole in the integrated development of urban and rural areas. Take the path of integrated urban-rural development, coordinate new industrialization, new urbanization, and comprehensive rural revitalization, comprehensively improve the level of urban-rural planning, construction, and governance integration, and promote common prosperity between urban and rural areas. Promoting a people-centered new urbanization can accelerate the transfer of surplus agricultural labor to non-agricultural sectors, achieving an overall improvement in labor productivity and income levels. In the process of promoting the urbanization of agricultural migrant population, not only can material prosperity be achieved by promoting employment and income growth, but spiritual prosperity can also be achieved by promoting comprehensive social progress and lifestyle changes

Promoting a people-oriented new urbanization can effectively support regional coordinated development. The people-oriented new urbanization focuses on promoting orderly population flow and efficient agglomeration of factors, which is conducive to further optimizing the regional development pattern and narrowing the development gap between the eastern, central, and western regions. In the process of promoting new urbanization, market division of labor and inter industry collaboration have been further expanded, which helps to form a complementary industrial pattern among regions. The new urbanization emphasizes putting people at the core, based on urban-rural integration and equalization of basic public services between urban and rural areas, which can effectively narrow the urban-rural gap and improve the quality of regional development. The new urbanization requires the coordinated development of urban agglomerations and metropolitan areas with the development of county-level economies and small towns, which helps accelerate the formation of a pattern of coordinated development between large, medium, small cities and small towns

Promoting a people-oriented new urbanization can expand the spatial carrier for the development of new quality productive forces. Advancing new urbanization will inevitably promote the large-scale agglomeration of production factors in space, and on this basis, continuously accelerate the division of labor and industrial innovation. This process has a high degree of inherent compatibility with the development of new quality productivity. The development of new quality productive forces requires achieving technological revolutionary breakthroughs, innovative allocation of production factors, and deep transformation and upgrading of industries, all of which rely on the continuous expansion of urbanization to provide spatial carriers. The new type of urbanization that promotes urban development and production, and deeply integrates industry and city, is the spatial carrier for optimizing the spatial allocation of new quality productivity

2. The achievements of urbanization construction have laid a solid foundation for promoting a people-oriented new type of urbanization.

Since the reform and opening up, especially since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, China's urbanization construction has made significant progress.. The urbanization rate of the permanent population has increased from 53.10% in 2012 to 66.16% in 2023. The coverage of basic public services in urban areas has significantly expanded, and the integrated development of urban agglomerations has accelerated significantly. A number of modern urban agglomerations are gradually cultivated, and the quality of people's lives continues to improve. The important achievements in urbanization construction have laid a solid foundation for promoting the people-oriented new urbanization

Deepen the reform of the registered residence system and lower the threshold of citizenization. The reform of the registered residence system is of great significance for promoting the coordinated development of large, small and medium-sized cities, optimizing the layout of urbanization in China and improving the quality of urbanization development. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, China has continued to deepen the reform of the registered residence system. Fully implement the requirement of canceling household registration restrictions for cities with a permanent population of less than 3 million in urban areas, comprehensively relax the household registration conditions for cities with a permanent population of 3 million to 5 million in urban areas, and improve the point based household registration policy for super large and mega cities with a permanent population of more than 5 million in urban areas. Relaxing the restrictions on urban household registration means that a large number of agricultural migrants with stable employment and livelihoods in urban areas can move their families to the city to settle down. In addition, the basic public services in cities and towns are gradually "de registered", and the allocation of public services and public resources is increasingly based on the "permanent population". The allocation of new urban land use indicators has gradually implemented a mechanism that coordinates the increment of new urban construction land indicators with the "permanent population"

Multiple measures will be taken to accelerate the urbanization process of agricultural migrant population. From the early stage of labor force entering the city, to the education of children entering the city, and then to the settlement of families in the city, the urbanization process of agricultural transfer population in China continues to accelerate, and the quality of new urbanization continues to improve. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, China has accelerated the promotion of new urbanization, achieved the urban settlement of about 100 million agricultural transfer population, completed the transformation of urban shantytowns and urban villages inhabited by about 100 million people, and guided about 100 million people in the central and western regions to urbanization nearby

Deeply explore the path and mode of promoting new urbanization. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, China has continuously summarized the experience of urbanization development, combined with practical innovation path models, and promoted significant improvements in the overall quantity, structure, and quality of new urbanization. In 2014, the National New Urbanization Plan (2014-2020) was promulgated. During the 13th Five Year Plan period, in order to accelerate the urbanization of agricultural transfer population and improve urban construction and governance level, three batches of national comprehensive pilot projects for new urbanization were continuously implemented. By the end of 2020, the urbanization rate of China's permanent population and the urbanization rate of registered residence registered population will both grow rapidly. During the 14th Five Year Plan period, the country issued the medium - to long-term "National New Urbanization Plan (2021-2035)", adhering to the path of new urbanization with Chinese characteristics, which is people-oriented, synchronized with the four modernizations, optimized layout, ecological civilization, and cultural inheritance. In 2022, the General Office of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council issued the "Opinions on Promoting Urbanization Construction with County Towns as Important Carriers", focusing on enhancing county-level development, further optimizing China's urban system through county-level urbanization, and supporting urban-rural integration development

3. Promoting a people-oriented new urbanization with common prosperity as the main direction

Promoting a people-oriented new urbanization focuses on promoting common prosperity as the main goal and main direction, relying on urban-rural integration development and institutional mechanism innovation, and promoting high-quality economic and social development.

Further promote the linkage between rural land system reform and new urbanization. The new urbanization is located in both the city and the countryside. To promote the people-oriented new urbanization, the first step is to accelerate the urbanization of agricultural migrant population. Continue to protect the legitimate land rights and interests of farmers who have settled in cities, so that they can both leave and return. Promote the growth of property income of agricultural migrant population through the institutional mechanism of urban-rural integration, further deepen the reform of agricultural land system, smooth the two-way flow of urban and rural factors, and form a long-term incentive mechanism for the urbanization of agricultural migrant population

Further promote the linkage between high-quality and full employment and new urbanization. Improving the level and quality of employment is an important lever to provide urban and rural residents with a greater sense of achievement through reform. Promoting people-oriented new urbanization and promoting high-quality and full employment are important contents. One is to guide employment through industrial upgrading. By undertaking industrial transfer, developing characteristic industries, transforming and upgrading traditional industries, cultivating and strengthening emerging industries, and laying out and constructing future industries, we can further increase high-quality employment opportunities. The second is to guide employment by expanding demand. The essence of urbanization is the aggregation of population and the expansion of division of labor, which in turn generates a large amount of demand. While promoting the development of productive and life service industries, it also brings more job opportunities. The third is to promote entrepreneurship and employment. Promoting new urbanization can create a fair competition market environment for the private economy and drive the development of individual economy and small and medium-sized enterprises; By linking with rural revitalization, we can drive entrepreneurship and employment. The fourth is to improve the public service system for employment, strengthen vocational training and investment in human capital, and achieve a high-quality and full employment pattern with optimized employment structure, sufficient employment opportunities, efficient matching of people and positions, and harmonious labor relations

Further promote the linkage between the construction of the social security system and the new urbanization. The Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China proposed to improve the social security system for flexible employment personnel, migrant workers, and new forms of employment. The Five Year Action Plan also clearly states to expand the social security coverage of agricultural migrant population. We will improve the social security system for people with flexible employment, migrant workers, and new forms of employment, completely eliminate the restrictions on registered residence registration in places of employment, and improve the transfer and continuation policy of social security relationships. Further promote the linkage between the construction of a high-quality social security system and new urbanization, firstly by expanding the coverage and striving to move from broad coverage to full coverage, so that the social security system can adapt more flexibly to flexible employment and new forms of employment. The second is fairness and portability. Social security should be synchronized with the flow of labor, reducing the cost of transferring and continuing social security relationships across urban and rural areas and regions. The third is to enhance the overall planning level, moderately increase the allocation of state-owned capital to enrich the social security fund, and better play the mutual assistance function of the social security fund. Based on the pension insurance for urban and rural residents, we will expand and strengthen the pension insurance for urban employees, and enhance the social security benefits for agricultural migrant populations