Ex-official calls for land ownership, sales system reform

BEIJING - A former senior official of the country's land authority has urged local governments to reform their land-based financing and end their monopoly on the land market to ease intensifying conflicts and bridge the urban-rural gap.

Zheng Zhenyuan, former deputy director of the planning department at the National Land Management Bureau, predecessor of the Ministry of Land and Resources, said on Sunday that an open, competitive and orderly land market means lifting the ban on collective land circulation in China.

Most of the sites involved are in rural and suburban areas and may not be used for commercial projects without government approval.