China, Facing Land Shortages, Encourages Saving Space 6 Feet Under

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/26/world/asia/china-graves-gated-communities.html

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BEIJING — Whether you are alive or dead, the Chinese authorities have made clear that there is just not that much room for you.

Days after the government ignited a public outcry with urban development guidelines that called for an end to gated residential communities, a directive that encourages family members to be buried together or to have their remains disposed of in environmentally friendly ways has drawn criticism online. Many commenters have linked the two measures, since both address the issue of population pressure on tight land supplies by asking citizens to change their way of life, and death.

On Wednesday, nine ministries including the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the National Development and Reform Commission released a joint directive, dated Feb. 19, laying out the plan encouraging smaller graves and shared plots. It also asks cities to provide incentives for degradable urns, scattering ashes and burials at sea. Breaches of burial rules by party officials, like building elaborate tombstones, will be investigated and “rectified,” it says.

On Sunday, a directive released by the State Council, China’s cabinet, and the Central Committee called on cities to stop permitting the construction of gated housing complexes and to gradually open existing ones to the public to ease traffic congestion and improve land use. Many homeowners have protested the move, citing safety and quality of life concerns as well as the protection of private property.

In a statement, the nine ministries clarified that the burial directive was not a “rigid request” for ordinary Chinese. Separately, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development promised that homeowners’ rights would be protected when opening up gated communities. But Internet users still expressed anger.

Comments that attracted the most “likes” said that ordinary citizens would have no issue with the two policies as long as Chinese leaders set an example, with many suggesting that environmentally friendly burials start with Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery, which is reserved for senior officials, revolutionary heroes and a few foreigners who contributed to the Communist cause, and with the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong in Tiananmen Square, a hall that occupies more than eight acres in central Beijing.

“Let’s dispose of the mummy in Tiananmen Square first,” one Weibo user commented under a news report on the burial directive.

“Does this mean that Maj. Gen. Mao will enter the mausoleum in the future?” another Weibo user asked, referring to Mao’s grandson Mao Xinyu, 46, who has been mocked for the suspicion that his promotions have owed more to family connections than to military prowess.

Another wrote: “They want to demolish this and that, but they get cold feet when it’s their turn to tear down their own walls,” referring to the government’s silence after online users urged that officials take the lead in carrying out the directive on gated communities by opening up top leaders’ compounds like Zhongnanhai in central Beijing.

“They dug up the ancestral graves of every emperor in every dynasty, calling it destroying the Four Olds, but Babaoshan and the Mausoleum are too sturdily constructed,” the commenter continued, referring to Mao’s campaign to destroy vestiges of traditional culture during the Cultural Revolution. “They ask couples to be buried together. Of course, it’s good to protect the environment. But they don’t seem to plan to do so themselves. Is this because they have too many wives?”

Under a survey conducted by a Chinese news portal on the idea of sharing a grave with relatives, a user in Changsha, Hunan Province, wrote, “Tearing down walls, digging up family graves, this is the length to which reform has gone?”

The survey, which received 12,000 responses by Thursday afternoon, showed a near split, with 46.2 percent approving of the suggestion and 42.4 disapproving. But the comments section attracted more than 76,000 comments, overwhelmingly critical.

“Opening up communities of the living, encouraging shared graves for the dead. Society is harmonious and healthy, land use is efficient,” one user wrote.

“Please bury people from the nine ministries together,” wrote another.

The Chinese authorities have been encouraging frugal burials in recent years in the face of land shortages and exorbitant cemetery prices. There have been sporadic reports in Chinese news media that the prices for grave plots are often higher than for apartments, reaching hundreds of thousands of renminbi a square meter in extreme cases.

The new burial directive was issued to address a call last year by the Central Committee and State Council to “step up the construction of ecological civilization” and their 2013 requirement that Communist cadres must take the lead in choosing simple burials. Months before that 2013 directive, Beijing announced an expansion plan for the Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery to provide room for the remains of an additional 10,000 people.

Many cities are offering cash awards of around 800 to 15,000 renminbi, or about $120 to $2,300, for families who choose sea burials or other land-sparing alternatives.

The ashes of the leader Deng Xiaoping, who died in 1997, were scattered at sea. The ashes of Premier Zhou Enlai, who died in 1976, were scattered over a reservoir on the outskirts of Beijing and in rivers in Tianjin and Shandong Province.