Time to reform charity donation system

The central government should withdraw from charity donations as soon as possible, according to a Southern Metropolis Daily article.

Excerpt:

Tsinghua University professor Deng Guosheng and his team looking into Chinese charities and donations released research findings showing that 80 percent of the 76 billion yuan ($12.1 billion) donated by charities for disaster relief following the Wenchuan earthquake in Sichuan province in 2008 finally became government revenue.

The professor also found that the government has been withdrawing gradually from the charity field from 2008 to 2013.

The government appointed 16 charity agencies, all with government backgrounds, to collect donations after the Wenchuan quake. After the 2010 Yushu earthquake in Qinghai, it stipulated that all donations should be handed to it directly.

After the Lushan earthquake in Sichuan province in 2013, the Civil Affairs Ministry observed that all legal charity organizations were able to collect donations from society for the first time.

Enterprises — State-owned and private — are important donators, but they still like to donate to charity organizations with government backgrounds, in an attempt to win preferential policies.

Reforming charity affairs will not be easy in China, because it affects the interests of some parties who have profited from their monopolies in this field for a long time.