Better pension scheme needed

One of the great successes of the Chinese government's social security policies in the past decade has been its expansion into the hitherto untouched area of the nation's countryside.

The introduction of nationwide rural pension scheme in 2009 was a landmark move. By the end of 2011, it had covered 326.43 million people, a number larger than that of the entire US social security system. The pension recognizes that farmers never strictly retire from work and instead become increasingly unable to maintain their income as they start getting old and weaker.