China's top leaders on Wednesday wrapped up a key meeting on economic policies for 2008, emphasizing the need for efforts to improve the people's livelihood and to build a harmonious society.

The three-day Central Economic Work Conference, the most important annual economic policy-making meeting which came about six weeks after the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, has placed unprecedented emphasis on the welfare of the people.

"Increased efforts to improve the people's livelihood will start with the most realistic problems, which people are concerned about most and are most directly related to people's interests," said the meeting.

To boost employment, the government will encourage people to start their own businesses, improve the training system for workers, offer a good employment service for college graduates and extend timely help for jobless families.

Latest statistics showed that 9.2 million urban residents found jobs in the first nine months of the year, while 810,000 out of the 847,000 jobless families nationwide obtained employment.

As China's economic boom of recent years has been accompanied by a widening gap between the rich and the poor, the meeting called for "rational income distribution" in order to better share the benefits of the spectacular economic and social development.

Residents in both urban and rural areas, especially low-income people, will be better paid, it said. A mechanism will be established to ensure "normal pay rises" for company employees and to guarantee the payment.

During his visit to some needy citizens in Beijing last month, Premier Wen Jiabao called on employers in the country to offer higher salaries and to strictly abide by the rules on minimum wages.

"Prices have been on the rise these days and I'm aware that even a one-yuan (US$0.13) increase in prices will affect people's lives," he said.

The meeting vowed to improve China's social security system, with more urban residents to be covered by pension and medical insurance.

In the countryside, an endowment insurance system will be set up, while the cooperative medical insurance, under which the government helps fund farmers' medical expenses, will continue to expand. It currently covered 85 percent of the country's rural residents.

The government will increase investment in education, exempting all the students in the country from paying tuition fees in the nine-year compulsory education, the meeting said.

The meeting also promised the common people better medical services and more low-rental houses. And the government will spend more fiscal revenue on underdeveloped provinces to reduce the regional wealth gap, it said.

(Xinhua News Agency December 6, 2007)