Almost a decade after China began curbing coal burning to stop thick winter smog, villagers in northern Hebei Province are struggling to afford their heating bills with most gas subsidies now phased out.
In 2017, Beijing mandated that dozens of northern areas wind down the use of coal-fired stoves in favor of electric and natural gas-powered systems.
Beijing allocated funds to refit stoves, but subsidies faded after three years, and additional aid has drastically declined, local media reported this week.
Photo: AFP
In Xushui, a district in Hebei about 100km outside Beijing, villagers said that they avoided turning on the heating, because it drained their incomes.
“Regular folks can’t afford it... Spending 1,000 yuan [US$143] per month on heat — no one can stand that,” a resident in his 60s said at a farmers’ market.
“Everyone likes that [the air] is clean. There’s not one person that doesn’t like it,” he said, asking not to be named for fear of “trouble.”
“But... the cost of clean [air] is high,” he added.
On the clear, sunny day Agence France-Presse visited, the warmest temperature in the district was just under 6°C, with lows of minus-7°C.
Restaurant worker Yin Chunlan said that her elderly in-laws need to pay up to 7,000 yuan per year to heat their six-room village home.
Yin, 48, lives in an apartment in town and says her annual bill is one-third of that.
“But it’s not the same in the village,” she said. “They have to set their heating much higher, and the temperature still isn’t as warm, so it wastes gas and wastes money.”
Yin’s in-laws often pile on extra blankets to stay warm.
“When I see it, it’s quite pitiful,” said Yin, wiping away a tear. “Nothing can be done.”
In one village, a woman in her 70s wore a green padded jacket underneath an apron as she crossed her outdoor courtyard.
Heating in her home is not turned on during the daytime, she said, showing the system’s switchboard mounted above her stove displaying “off.”
The woman, who did not give her name, said the dial could reach 60°C. When asked if the temperature inside could feel as warm, she laughed.
Reports that villagers in Hebei were layering up under quilts to avoid costly heating peppered Chinese social media in the first week of the new year.
An article by the Farmers’ Daily reshared in state media China Central Television ‘s (CCTV) opinion section said in rural Hebei natural gas costs up to 3.4 yuan per cubic meter compared with 2.6 yuan in rural areas of Beijing.
Villagers said they felt the huge price gap was unfair.
However, the original article was quickly taken down, with republications, including the CCTV article, inaccessible days later.
The Chinese Ministry of Finance said in 2021 a total of 13.2 billion yuan in funds had been distributed for clean heating across Hebei.
However, subsidies to support the installation of new systems and for gas bills, which had lasted three years, would not be renewed, it said in a letter.
The move came around the same time that international gas prices were driven up by Russia’s war in Ukraine. Last year, Chinese authorities reported national gas consumption growth had slowed.
The Chinese ministry, responding to a local proposal to increase financial support for provincial pollution control, said special funds would be arranged for additional subsidies in rural areas, but gave no details of the rollout.
A local Xushui government platform said in 2017 that some households would be eligible to receive 300 yuan in gas subsidies.
For villager Zhang Yanjun, that amount hardly made a dent in his bill of several thousand yuan per season.
The 55-year-old laborer said he had already spent more than 5,000 yuan on heating his home since October last year.
“If you give 300 or 200 yuan or something, it’s the same as if you gave no subsidies at all,” he said.
Australians were downloading virtual private networks (VPNs) in droves, while one of the world’s largest porn distributors said it was blocking users from its platforms as the country yesterday rolled out sweeping online age restriction. Australia in December became the first country to impose a nationwide ban on teenagers using social media. A separate law now requires artificial intelligence (AI)-powered chatbot services to keep certain content — including pornography, extreme violence and self-harm and eating disorder material — from minors or face fines of up to A$49.5 million (US$34.6 million). The country also joined Britain, France and dozens of US states requiring
Hungarian authorities temporarily detained seven Ukrainian citizens and seized two armored cars carrying tens of millions of euros in cash across Hungary on suspicion of money laundering, officials said on Friday. The Ukrainians were released on Friday, following their detention on Thursday, but Hungarian officials held onto the cash, prompting Ukraine to accuse Hungary’s Russia-friendly government of illegally seizing the money. “We will not tolerate this state banditism,” Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said. The seven detained Ukrainians were employees of the Ukrainian state-owned Oschadbank, who were traveling in the two armored cars that were carrying the money between Austria and
Kosovar President Vjosa Osmani on Friday after dissolving the Kosovar parliament said a snap election should be held as soon as possible to avoid another prolonged political crisis in the Balkan country at a time of global turmoil. Osmani said it is important for Kosovo to wrap up the upcoming election process and form functional institutions for political stability as the war rages in the Middle East. “Precisely because the geopolitical situation is that complex, it is important to finish this electoral process which is coming up,” she said. “It is very hard now to imagine what will happen next.” Kosovo, which declared
MORE BANS: Australia last year required sites to remove accounts held by under-16s, with a few countries pushing for similar action at an EU level and India considering its own ban Indonesia on Friday said it would ban social media access for children under 16, citing threats from online pornography, cyberbullying, online fraud and Internet addiction. “Accounts belonging to children under 16 on high-risk platforms will start to be deactivated, beginning with YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, Bigo Live and Roblox,” Indonesian Minister of Communications and Digital Meutya Hafid said. “The government is stepping in so that parents no longer have to fight alone against the giants of the algorithm. Implementation will begin on March 28, 2026,” she said. The social media ban would be introduced in stages “until all platforms fulfill their
RSS