2) Spending on education reached 159.854 billion yuan, a 48.5% gain and equivalent to 102.4% of the target. A total of 61.81 billion yuan went to making free compulsory education available in both urban and rural areas. We stopped collecting tuition and miscellaneous fees from all urban students receiving compulsory education starting last autumn, raised the level of funding for operating expenses for rural compulsory education, provided free textbooks required by the state to rural students receiving compulsory education, and raised the school heating subsidies for rural primary and secondary schools in northern China. A total of 5.31 billion yuan was used to step up development of new schools with improved sanitation facilities as part of the developing new countryside and construction of primary and secondary school buildings in the central and western regions and improve the living facilities in rural schools there. A total of 22.3 billion yuan was used to grant financial assistance to students from poor families at regular undergraduate institutions, vocational colleges and secondary vocational schools. Secondary vocational school students from poor urban families and rural areas received financial aid of 1,500 yuan per student a year, a policy benefiting 90% of the student population. We supported development of three groups of state-level demonstration vocational colleges totaling 100 schools, resulting in improvement in the quality of their teachers and operating conditions. A total of 43.243 billion yuan was spent to raise the quality of higher education and begin full-scale development of the third phase of the 211 Project for Higher Education.

3) Expenditures for medical and health care amounted to 82.68 billion yuan, a 24.5% growth and equivalent to 99.4% of the target. We established a new type of cooperative medical care system in all rural areas across the country, covering more than 800 million residents. We increased the number of pilot cities making basic medical insurance available to their non-working residents from 88 to 317, with the number of participating residents increasing from 42.91 million to over 100 million. The central government raised the level of financial aid to 40 yuan per person a year in the central and western regions, and granted a certain level of subsidies to the eastern region. These measures claimed expenditures totaling 27.868 billion yuan. Eight billion yuan was used to expand the basic medical insurance program for urban workers to include all retirees from state-owned enterprises subject to policy-mandated closure or bankruptcy in all localities of the country. We increased funding for public health in areas such as prevention and control of major diseases, as well as for oversight and supervision of food and drugs and development of traditional Chinese medicine, improved medical treatment procedures for public emergencies, stepped up public health and epidemic prevention efforts, and screened infants and pre-school children potentially exposed to melamine-tainted milk power free of charge. These measures claimed expenditures by the central government totaling 12.614 billion yuan. A total of 3.4 billion yuan went to increasing medical assistance in both urban and rural areas, and providing assistance for medical care for urban and rural residents receiving cost of living allowances and rural childless and infirm residents who receive subsidies to cover food, clothing, medical care, housing and burial expenses to enable them to obtain medical insurance and reduce the burden on them from medical expenditures. We spent 6.6 billion yuan to step up development of public health facilities in counties and townships and equip them with basic medical equipment. We expanded the area of the country covered by the policy granting allowances to rural women giving birth in hospitals so that it now covers the entire central and western regions, and the central government raised the allowances to 300 yuan per person for the central region and 400 yuan for the western region.

4) Expenditures for the social safety net and employment work reached 274.359 billion yuan, up 19.2% and equivalent to 99.3% of the target. A total of 36.31 billion yuan was used to improve all aspects of the cost of living allowance system for both urban and rural residents and raise the monthly allowances for urban dwellers by 15 yuan per person and for rural residents by 10 yuan per person on January 1 and again on July 1. The central government allocated 112.743 billion yuan in subsidies for old-age insurance to continue to increase basic old-age benefits for retirees from state-owned enterprises by 110 yuan per person a month, with the focus on the central and western regions and northeast China and other old industrial bases. Twenty billion yuan was spent to support policy-mandated closures or bankruptcies of 80 state-owned enterprises and provide for 320,000 of their laid-off employees. The central government spent 25.208 billion yuan to support the implementation of policies to secure employment for people experiencing difficulty in finding employment by granting them subsidies for subscribing to social security and working in low-paying public service positions. We improved the policies on charges and fees and on guaranteed small loans to encourage business startups in order to expand employment.