China's charity cause is hobbled by such problems as a lack of transparency, unattractive projects and failure to attract donors with preferential State policies, according to an official with the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

Wang Zhenyao, director of the disaster relief department of the ministry, told a news briefing on Wednesday that charity organizations, especially NGOs, are not professionally managed.

"Their annual reports often don't have enough details such as how much money each project costs and how decisions are made," Wang said. "The low transparency has turned away many potential donors."

China has about 1,000 registered charity organizations.

Donations totaled 10 billion yuan (US$1.28 billion) last year, about the same level annually since 1998, according to Wang. Most of it came from home, with overseas donations making up a small part.

Ge Daosheng, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' Institute of Sociology, said most charity organizations are still in their infancy.

"Chinese people are not short of compassion but channels of donations have become a bottleneck," he said.

The lack of good charity projects is another problem many are in place for a short time and fail to generate long-term benefits, Ge said.

A good project should enable beneficiaries to become independent without a continuous flow of donations, he said.

He also referred to a policy jointly issued by the Ministry of Finance and the State Administration of Taxation last year, under which corporate or individual donors can claim deductions from taxable income if they donate to any of the 20 or so major charity organizations.

However, the policy has failed to entice donors in many places and procedures are often too complicated, he said.

The ministry on Wednesday released a list of 50 candidates, including individuals and organizations, for the 2006 China Charity Award, the highest government award for charity.

The awards comprise five prizes best donor, best volunteer, best domestic charity enterprise, best foreign charity enterprise and best charity project.

(China Daily January 12, 2007)