At a State Council executive meeting on Jan 22, Premier Li Keqiang urged more efforts for a people-oriented new-type urbanization as it will improve people’s livelihood, boost the economy and coordinate regional development.

During the process of implementing the new-type urbanization, land reform, permanent residence permits and shantytown renovation will be three major issues, he said.

The meeting on Jan 22 asked local governments to implement the new regulation on permanent residence permits, ensuring that city dwellers who have not yet acquired hukou or registered permanent residence have access to basic services such as education, employment, medical care and legal assistance.

The Premier said the residence permit is for providing help to city dwellers who have stable job position but no hukou, so “it must be connected with public services, and have some ‘true value’”.

He also said deepening reform on the residence permit system will greatly advance the new-type urbanization.

The meeting decided to explore voluntary systems for the migrant rural population to relinquish land contract rights, the right of land use for residence, and the right for distribution of collective income.

“The situation of land use is different in different places of China, and we should create more conditions for the local places, and explore more experiences in the pilot areas for urbanization,” the Premier said.

The meeting also decided to speed up the renovation of shantytowns and dilapidated buildings, and expand the renovation work to main towns in China.

Shantytown renovation was also one of the Premier’s concerns at the meeting. He visited one of the nation’s largest shantytown areas - 13 square kilometers in Inner Mongolia autonomous region - three years ago, and now the government has completed renovation work there, moving 110,000 people into new houses.

The Premier said China still has 100 million people in shantytown areas, and related departments should identify them with advanced new technologies and find more potential for implementation of the new-type urbanization.