????An effort was made
to see that all working institutions for ethnic minorities
from the central level downwards as well as ethnic institutes
were reopened.
A readjustment was made in the administrative
division of the Mongolian Autonomous Region: Three leagues
and three banners which had been amalgamated into other
provinces and autonomous regions during the Cultural
Revolution of 1966-67 were restored to it. The institution
of the Bouyei-Miao Autonomous Prefecture in Guizhou
and a number of autonomous counties in Guizhou, Sichuan,
Yunnan, Hubei and Gansu provinces helped increase minority
self-government.
Part of the post-Cultural Revolution
rectification included the replacement of Han officials
in the minority areas with leaders of native origin.
By 1978, the minority self-governments could boast of
800,000 non-Han officials, 80 times those in 1949. By
1983, 1.3 million minority managers and executives were
on the job. In the country's 5 autonomous regions, 31
autonomous prefectures and 96 autonomous counties (banners),
self-governments are all headed by cadres of ethnic
minority origin.
Intensified efforts were made to strengthen
construction work in the border areas and assist the
minority peoples in their rehabilitation and development
of production.
Since 1979, restructuring of the rural
economy has aided ethnic minority peoples as it has
helped Han farmers in central China. By raising the
state purchase price for farm produce and sideline products,
encouraging individual responsibility for production
and profits, and instituting private crop plots within
the cooperative structure, the central government has
achieved spectacular results in the rural economy. Individual
family specialized enterprises and exemption from certain
taxes have also helped minority peoples lead a more
prosperous life.
With China's grain supply now firmly
sufficient to feed its billion people, the government
is encouraging other lines of agriculture, livestock
management and forestry, as well as taking specific
measures to develop trade and specialized goods in the
minority areas.
In many places monasteries and mosques
have been reopened to the public, with renovations and
repair work done, to reemphasize the policy on religious
freedom and to give respect to the traditions and customs
of the minority peoples. All traditional religious festivals
and activities such as Buddhist worship, chanting scriptures,
burning incense, initiating believers into monkhood
or nunhood, performing services and fasting at home
or in monasteries and mosques are protected by law.
With their political status restored
and special allowances made in line with the national
policy on "Forming a United Front," a large
number of upper-strata people (including upper-strata
religious leaders) of the minority groups have been
rehabilitated.
In the last few years, an annually
increasing output in the ethnic autonomous areas has
been achieved in industry and agriculture. In 1984 they
had a gross product valued at 68.17 billion yuan (calculated
according to the constant price of 1980), 13.7 times
over 1949, averaging an annual increase of 7.8 per cent
from 1950 to 1984. Particularly noteworthy was their
development in agricultural production and livestock
management. In 1984, the total output of agriculture
was valued at 33.17 billion yuan, an increase of 555
per cent over 1949.
Since 1979, through a combination of
sound agricultural policy and good weather conditions,
very strong harvests have been reaped in the minority
areas. The expansion of decision-making powers at local
levels, the granting of tax exemptions and the introduction
of state subsidies, and in particular the linkage of
increased production with increased individual income
have proven very effective.
Total agricultural product increased
at an annual rate of 5 per cent (avg.) between 1949
and 1990s.
At the end of 1949 farm animals in
the ethnical autonomous areas numbered 41 million head;
these had increased to 182 million by 1984, averaging
an annual growth rate of 4.3 per cent from 1950 to 1984.
Before 1949, modern industry was almost
non-existent in the minority areas except for a little
handicraft industry and some other backward industrial
lines. But with the founding of the People's Republic
came a speedy growth of local industry in the ethnical
autonomous areas.
In the last 35 years, there have been
37,000 small, medium-sized, and modern industrial enterprises
built in the minority areas. Even some large state enterprises
are in minority regions, including the Baotou Iron and
Steel Company in Inner Mongolia, the Karamay Oilfield
in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the Honghe
River Water Conservancy Project in the Guangxi Zhuang
Autonomous Region, and the Helanshan Coal Mine in the
Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.
In 1984, the total value of industrial
output in the minority areas shot up to 35 billion yuan
(calculated according to the constant price of 1980),
63 times that in 1949, averaging an annual increase
of 12.6 per cent.
Because of the largely rural and agricultural
background of the minority peoples, and because of an
overemphasis in the past on China's heavy industrial
capacity, planning for development in the autonomous
ethnic areas has focused largely on light industry.
Before 1949 there was no trunk railway
line in southwestern China, just a narrow-gauge railway
in Yunnan Province and 60 kilometers of mining rail
tracks in Sichuan. In Guizhou Province there was practically
no railway. But now there are a number of trunk railways,
including the Chengdu-Chongqing, Sichuan-Guizhou (Chongqing-Guiyang),
Baoji-Chengdu, Chengdu-Kunming, Xiangfan-Chongqing,
Guizhou-Kunming, Hunan-Guizhou (Zhuzhou-Guiyang) and
Guizhou-Guangxi (Guiyang-Liuzhou) railways. By the mid-1980s
with a total length of 5,900 kilometres long, excluding
branch lines, they had accounted for about 11.7 per
cent of the country's total railway mileage to form
a transportation network over the southwestern part
of China.
On the vast expanse of northwest China
(including Qinghai, Xinjiang and Ningxia), pre-1949
railway mileage was negligible. There was only a short
railway between Shaanxi Province and Tianshui in Gansu
Province, and it often collapsed owing to poor engineering.
After 1949, with the completion of the Tianshui-Lanzhou
Railway, the whole Longhai line, from Lianyungang on
the east coast to Lanzhou, capital of Gansu, was open
to traffic. Stretching across the Northwest now are
a number of new trunk lines, including the Lanzhou-Xinjiang,
Lanzhou-Qinghai, Baotou-Lanzhou, Southern Xinjiang and
Qinghai-Tibet railways, a total of 7,000 kilometres,
or 14 per cent of the country's total. By linking the
west with the coastal and inland provinces to make it
more easily accessible to the whole of China, the new
railways contribute to the exploitation of mineral and
natural resources and have brought a shift in the distribution
of the country's industry.
National
Autonomous Regions Economic Growth Indicators
|
1949 |
1978 |
1984 |
Electricity |
|
17.4 billion kw/h |
26.6 billion kw/h |
Crude oil |
|
5.77 million tons |
7 million tons |
Timber |
|
12.1 mil. cubic metres |
16.65 mil.cubic metres |
Cotton cloth |
|
373 million metres |
474 million metres |
Cigarette |
|
514,000 cases |
1.74 million cases |
Railway |
3,511 km |
9,018 km |
12,097 km |
Highway |
11,400 km |
208,000 km |
235,400 km |
Retail sales |
980 million yuan |
15 billion yuan |
32.6 billion yuan |
????In the 50 years since the founding of the
People's Republic, much has been achieved in higher
education by the minority nationalities. Today over
a dozen ethnic minority institutes have been established
nationwide for training minority officials and professionals.
Before 1949, there was hardly any school
at all in the minority areas; higher learning was virtually
a blank. But with the development of the economy, great
advances have been made in minority education. In June
1951, the Central Institute for Nationalities was inaugurated
in Beijing. Later, nine similar institutes were set
up in northwestern, southwestern and central-south China,
and in Guangxi, Qinghai, Guangdong and Tibet. In 1984,
the No. 2 Northwest Institute for Nationalities opened
in Xinjiang.
With the improvement of conditions
in teaching and scientific research in minority institutions
of higher learning, many minority intellectuals now
hold bachelor's and master's degrees. Minority candidates
for doctorates began to be enrolled in 1984. Special
training classes are open in many colleges and universities
for ethnic minority students. By the end of 1984, a
total of 69,000 minority students had been enrolled
in the country's institutions of higher learning.
In 1984, total enrollment of minority
students in junior and senior middle schools was 2.18
million compared to 92,000 in 1952; enrollment of ethnic
primary school students grew from 1.47 million in 1952
to 9 million in 1984.
In the last 50 years minority peoples
have also made great advances in medical and health
care. In 1949, only 361 medical service units were active
in minority areas, but by 1984 these had increased to
29,794, a yearly increase of 13.4 per cent from 1950
to 1984; professional medical and health personnel numbered
406,880 in 1984 compared to 3,530 in 1949, an annual
increase of 14.5 per cent during the period.
When all is said, work on ethnic minorities
in China did not go smoothly. There were major disruptions
caused by the Cultural Revolution of 1966-76 and mistakes
committed by people who showed no regard to special
conditions of minority areas. There have been significant
economic and cultural achievements in minority areas
compared with their past. But in comparison with other
areas in the country, ethnic minority areas are still
backward. Development of China's ethnic minority areas
is a long-term task.
The general task face the nation is
not much different from what was formulated in 1982:
to unite the people of all ethnic minorities in hard
work and self-reliance to achieve the modernization
of China's industry, agriculture, national defense and
science and technology and to make China a culturally
advanced and highly democratic socialist country; and
in the course of the modernization drive, to take active
steps to help the minority groups speed up their economic
and cultural construction for a gradual elimination
of the de facto inequality between all ethnic groups.
|