Читать книгу The Emerging Markets Handbook - Pran Tiku - Страница 116

During his time in office Premier Wen Jiabao remarked that China had met its stated goal of education spending targeted at 4% of GDP (the target was set in 1993). The government spent $1.25 billion from 2008 to 2012 with an average annual increase of 21.6%, or 4% of the nation’s GDP in 2012. The government plans to maintain spending at 4% of GDP and increase monitoring of how funds are spent.

According to Bloomberg, healthcare spending in China is expected to triple to 1 trillion by 2020, driven mostly by an aging population and government efforts to broaden insurance coverage. According to McKinsey, China is expected to increase healthcare spending from 5.5% of GDP to 7% of GDP. The government is looking to provide a safety net for the large portion of the population that will be retiring in the coming decades.

China is making a $250 billion a year investment in human capital in an effort to create a broadly educated workforce.

Meanwhile, private industry is also taking the lead to make sure the graduates they are hiring have the skills to be productive in their jobs. For example, carmaker Geely has started the Beijing Geely University that trains about 20,000 students in science and engineering, specifically in auto engineering.

In the last decade China has doubled the number of colleges and universities to 2409 and produces 8 million graduates a year. China is aiming for a large, more broadly skilled workforce to compete with the West as it looks to take the lead in several industries including alternative energy, energy efficiency, environmental protection, biotechnology, advanced information technologies, and high-end equipment manufacturing.

China gets a score of 59.57 out of 100 in the social Bloomberg ESG rankings.