CCTV9英语新闻：China's urban population now at 56%

Now for more on the changing demographics of urban and rural China, we are joined in the studio by my colleague Wu Haojun.

We know in the past decades, China has experienced an urbanization drive that has seen the migration of millions and millions of people from the rural regions to the cities. What does the overall picture look like now?

This rural-urban migration is said to be the the largest ever in human history especially in such a short period of time. The number of urban dwellers in China surpassed their rural peers for the first time back at the end of 2011. And by the end of 2015, 56% of China’s total population lived in urban areas. What’s more impressive than the numbers is the countless stories and actual lives lived by the millions of so-called “migrant workers” who made up the bulk of the country’s new urban residents. There are an estimated 260 million migrant workers in China, who left their farms, and sometimes families behind, to seek a better paying job and a more prosperous future in China’s ever-expanding urban centers. They predominantly work in manufacturing, in factories along China’s enterprising east coast and in southern manufacturing hubs such as Guangzhou and Shenzhen. They are the backbone behind China’s rise as a global manufacturing powerhouse. But in recent years, we’ve seen a significant increase in the number of migrant workers employed in the service sector. And especially the younger generation is becoming increasingly better educated, and taking on better paying and better quality jobs.