The coverage of China's major social security programs, old-age, medical, maternity and industrial injury, expanded to reach 165.5 million, 127 million, 44.9 million and 70 million people by March, according to statistics released Thursday by the Ministry of Labor and Social Security.
  
The figures are 1.49 million, 3.04 million, 1.04 million and 1.64 million more than those of the last year.
  
The statistics also showed that the old-age insurance fund paid retirees a total of 99.2 billion yuan (US$11.97 billion) in the first three months and there were no records of delaying pensions throughout the country.
  
"The rapid economic development in recent years has contributed to the rise in the balance of the old-age insurance fund. Many companies have been able to make up delayed pensions for their retirees," said the ministry's spokesman, Hu Xiaoyi, at a press conference.
  
China had 37.5 million enterprises retirees by this March, and 23.2 million, or 61.7 percent of them, are cared for by residential communities.
  
Hu said that the ministry will further standardize the premium payment by employees of private enterprises or people with no fixed jobs and promote the establishment of the enterprise annuity system.
  
According to the statistics, China had 104.4 million people covered by unemployment insurance by March, with 4.1 million having received insurance payment.
  
"Our next work is to take more people from non-public sectors into the coverage of unemployment insurance and set up an unemployment early-warning system," Hu said.
  
He pointed out that funds for the old-age insurance, unemployment insurance, medical insurance and industrial injury insurance had all increased rapidly in the first quarter, amounting to 102.8 billion yuan, 6.7 billion yuan, 29.8 billion yuan and 1.6 billion yuan.

(Xinhua News Agency April 22, 2005)