Xinhua Insight: China's painful transition to slower but sustainable growth (2)

still higher than the WHO recommended level, but 28.7 percent and 9.9 percent lower than the levels in 2013.

While China's smog has become infamous, its water and soil pollution may pose even greater threats to the country as industrialization and urbanization take their toll.

Water from more than one-fourth of rivers and two-thirds of lakes is undrinkable, according to the Ministry of Water Resources.

The threats have forced China to take action. Plans to address water pollution have been implemented, while authorities are devising an action plan for soil pollution. The Ministry of Environmental Protection also aims to set up three departments dedicated to water, air and soil protection.

According to China's 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020), water consumption per 10,000 yuan of GDP will fall 23 percent by 2020, while energy consumption per unit of GDP will be cut by 15 percent. Carbon dioxide emissions will also be cut by 18 percent.

In a country of more than 1.3 billion people, pains and challenges are inevitable in the transition to a balanced and sustainable economy.

"But economic growth and environmental protection can go arm-in-arm. Cutting emissions and overcapacity will shift the country's focus to green and innovative industries to create a quality-oriented, sustainable economy," said Bao Jingling, former chief engineer with the Tianjin environmental protection bureau.

NAGGING POVERTY

While rich Chinese buy homes in clean coastal cities, send their children to Los Angeles schools, and shop in Paris, more than 55 million are struggling to survive due to poverty.

Dengjiao is a poor, remote village, mostly inhabited by ethnic Miao, in the rocky hills of Guizhou, a province in southwestern China. The per capita net income for the 2,380 villagers last year was 1,200 yuan, barely half of the official poverty line of 2,300 yuan by 2010 price standards.

Villager Zhang Yongsheng owns a calf, a pig, a shabby wooden house above the pen, an old TV set, and little else. He slaughters the pig for the lunar new year feast and sells a calf every two years when it has grown up.

The family's basic living allowance from the local government is 390 yuan, and without the cash from the calf and loans from rural credit cooperatives, he could not cover his paralyzed wife's medical bills.

"We farmers dare not rest, let alone get ill," said Zhang, 64, who is more than 20,000 yuan in debt.

Compared with the developed eastern part of the country, China's inland rural areas have lagged behind. Decades of economic growth have amplified the disparities between the rich and poor, and there are still millions of rural families like Zhang's grappling with abject poverty.

China's Gini coefficient, which measures the rich-poor gap, with 0 indicating total equality and 1 representing complete inequality, stood at 0.462 in 2015, dropping for seven years in a row after the index hit 0.491 in 2008. However, it remains above the international warning line of 0.4, which suggests a comparatively large income gap.

Last year, the annual average disposable income of rural residents per capita was 11,422 yuan. That's about one-third of that of urban residents, which was 31,195 yuan.

The government has acknowledged how harmful such disparities can be by trying to expand the wealth pool fairly for sustainable development.

China has lifted more than 700 million people out of poverty between 1978 and 2014, and was the first developing country to meet the UN target of halving the poor population ahead of the 2015 deadline.

It will spare no efforts to help the remaining 55 million people shake off poverty by 2020. It's the most arduous task in the goal of building a moderately prosperous society.

Chinese leaders have called for "high precision" in poverty relief, mapping out policies and plans in accordance with varying situations and causes of poverty.

For Zhang and 10 million other impoverished people across the country, relocating for an easier life looks like the best bet.

Last year, 30 households in his village were relocated to the county seat. Another 150 households will be moving this year. Zhang hopes his son and daughter-in-law, among the country's more than 200 million migrant workers, can return home from the coastal manufacturing hub of Guangdong Province.

Zhang, who is fond of alcohol, imagines a more prosperous future in which he could afford a bottle of his own now and then, so he would not have to wait for a wedding or funeral to enjoy a free drink. Endi