Poverty, unemployment and illiteracy continue to plague the country's disabled population, despite them enjoying improvements in healthcare and living conditions, a national survey has said.

The survey said there are currently 2.97 million disabled people of working age employed in urban areas and about 4.7 million who are unemployed.

"Both the number of disabled people getting jobs and the quality of the jobs they do have improved over recent years thanks to the nation's favorable policies and regulations," said Qian Pengjiang, director of the education and employment department of the China Disabled Persons' Federation, comparing the latest results with those of the first such survey, which was conducted in 1987.

However, discrimination against disabled people remains deeply rooted in society, Qian said.

"It will take a long time for society to understand the fact that disabled people are capable of contributing, instead of being regarded as charity cases. Disabled people need to be given the chance to show their abilities."

China has about 83 million disabled people, who account for 6.34 percent of the population. More than 75 percent of them (62.25 million) live in rural areas.

A disabled person's average annual per capita income is 4,864 yuan ($630) in urban areas and 2,260 yuan in rural areas. Both figures are less then half the national averages, which are 11,321 yuan and 4,631 yuan, respectively, the report said.

Meanwhile, the survey also said that disabled people receive less education than their able-bodied peers.

In 2006, the number of illiterate disabled people aged 15 or above was 35.91 million, 43.29 percent, while the national illiteracy rate was 6.72 percent.

About 63.19 percent of the 2.46 million disabled children of school age actually go to school, compared with 97 percent of "normal" children, the report said.

Just 1.13 percent of the nation's disabled people have received a college education, about a fifth of the national figure of 5.18 percent, the survey said.

The survey was conducted between April 1 and May 31, 2006, in all 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities on the Chinese mainland and by 16 government organizations, including the National Statistics Bureau, the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the Ministry of Health and the China Disabled Persons' Federation.

(China Daily 05/30/2007 page3)