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| Land market forces and government’s role in sprawl: T Zhang
urban sprawl. City and town governments and enterprises have been given power over local land use regulation and financial decisions. Supervision over land use from superior administrations has largely been removed. Land disposition is no longer an administrative decision but rather an economic action. All parties involved in land development and transfer- ence manage land simply based on its economic value with little consideration of long-term consequences of their actions, except economic considerations. At the same time, a tax sharing arrangement between the central government and provinces was adopted. Before the reform, under the planned econ- omy, the central government provided funding to almost all local development projects. The new rev- enue distribution regulation entitles local government to share tax revenue, but it cuts most funds that pre- viously came from the central government. Similar arrangements have been made within local govern- ment entities. A local municipal government now has to find its own funding for its infrastructure projects, schools, and most of its welfare programs. The press- ure on municipal government is tremendous. Since land is the most valuable “commodity” under the control of a municipal government, generating revenue from leasing land use rights and charging land use fees has become the most popular practice for local government. Today, there are three types of revenue from land in China: land tax, charges on land leasing, and a variety of land use fees. Land tax has existed since 1949, but it was elimin- ated in urban areas in 1956, as a result of the Socializ- ation Movement that nationalized all urban economic activities. Because all enterprises, institutions, hous- ing stocks and urban land were owned by the public sector, a land tax on an enterprise or an institution would become a charge on government itself. After the reform, however, investors received land use rights for up to 70 years and thus became the real “owners” during the leasing period. A land tax is charged on users now. Land tax has two forms: urban land use tax and cultivated land occupation tax. The former refers to tax on urban land currently in non- farm uses, and the latter is the tax on farmland acqui- sition. According to the current Chinese tax regu- lation, the two kinds of land tax are to be shared by the central and local governments. As a result, only 50 percent of cities collect this tax today. Many municipalities prefer not to charge land tax on local enterprises so as to keep revenue from being lost to the central government, especially in recent years when local enterprises have been facing financial problems. Land leasing charge refers to the charge on leasing land use rights. Because the state owns all urban land, as defined by the Constitution, revenue from leasing land use rights is to be shared by the central and local governments. However, local governments often do not think it fair to give “a big piece of the pie” to the central government, because it is local government 130 that invests “local money” on land development before the land can be leased. This is still a problem to be solved. For local governments, the land leasing charge is the most important revenue from land. The leasing charge alone annually brings municipalities more than 10 billion yuan (8.3 yuan equals US$1, 1998) to China’s east coast, reported the People’s Daily (the Chinese Communist Party’s official newspaper). From 1990 to 1995, Shanghai’s Pudong New District, a newly developed area of the city, had collected US$190 million directly from land leasing (People’s Daily, August 23, 1997). The Shanghai municipal government had collected $8.51 billion plus 10.3 billion RMB (about $1.3 billion) from land leasing in the period of 1988 to 1996 (Zhao et al., 1998). Experts estimated that, on average, 15 to 20 percent of local revenue came from land leasing in recent years. Most of the revenue is spent on infra- structure improvement and extension projects, which makes urban sprawl financially possible. Land use fees are charges paid to local government for its provision of infrastructure services to users. These fees are fully under the control of local govern- ment, and represent another main revenue source for the municipality. Many municipal governments prefer to charge use fees rather than collecting land tax. Income from use fees is used to support infrastructure extension projects. Some municipal governments (e.g. Shanghai) also charge fees for the “vegetable pro- duction foundation”. The foundation collects money to support the re-creation of farmland for the land lost in urban development. The amount of land generated revenue has increased since the urban construction boom. Table 9 shows the increase of land generated revenue from 1987 to 1990 in Shanghai, and the land income became even more important from 1990 to 1996. Both “push” and “pull” forces drive local govern- ment on urban growth policy. Growth of urban popu- lation, an enormous demand for housing, and, especially, increasing construction activity push municipal governments to acquire more land. While more farmland is being converted to urban uses, more investment is needed to develop infrastructure in new areas. When more money is needed, the central government cuts most development funds under the policy of decentralization and with the philosophy of “share decision power, share responsibility”, forcing local governments to seek their own sources. All these factors push local governments to acquire and lease more land so as to collect more revenue from land development. With decentralization, local governments now grant land use regulation power, which had previously been under the control of higher government (the central and provincial government) before the reform. Peas- ants in edge areas surrounding central city long to become “urban residents”, county and village leaders would like to “sell” their land and to annex their municipalities to the central city. This decentralized Land market forces and government’s role in sprawl: T Zhang tải về 149.87 Kb. Chia sẻ với bạn bè của bạn:
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