Thematic Areas

Selected Thematic Areas

This section presents summaries of the findings of UN teams assigned to address certain individual themes, these being: health, basic education, food security and agriculture, industrial restructuring and regional development, housing and habitat, environment and energy, and natural disaster management. The findings of the assessment, analysis and identification of certain priority issues for each have important unique features as well as some shared, strategic similarities in terms of assessment of trends; analysis of key problems and priority issues. If China is able to more effectively address most of the issues identified, the country would be able to make more rapid and effective progress in meeting both overall development goals as well as meeting the basic needs and rights of its disadvantaged population.

The assessment of trends for the last decade concludes that China has made significant achievements in virtually all the subjects reviewed. In health, for example, there have been remarkable improvements in quality of life of many children under-five as China has acted to implement provisions of relevant major global conferences and other related international initiatives. In basic education, China has, essentially, achieved the goal of "universal enrolment" for girls as well as boys (95 per cent). Its law on basic education is a fine example of efforts to assure sustainability of nine years of compulsory basic education. Likewise, there have been gains in food security, nutrition and sustainable agriculture as the Government has treated these subjects as priority concerns.