Provincial authorities in Henan are taking steps to try to unify the household registration system.

An old man holds his hukou book – household register before the camera. Henan province issued a guideline on November 12 to unify the hukou system. [Photo: Baidu.com]

The changes to the Hukou system will make no distinction between rural and urban registrations.

This means both farmers and people living in the cities will enjoy the same access to jobs, education and health care.

Henan, with a population of roughly 106-million, is still made up primarily of farmers, with 56 percent of the provincial population holding a rural Hukou.

Liu Wei with Henan's Provincial Public Security Bureau says the changes won't be automatic.

"People who have legal dwellings, including rented homes, can apply for a small city hukou. If they want a Hukou for medium-sized cities with a population of 500,000 to one million, they have to pay a social insurance for at least one year. If they want to apply for household registration in big cities with a population of over one million, they have to pay social insurance for at least two years."

The Chinese household registration system was first set up at the beginning of the so-called Great Leap Forward in 1958 to keep the Chinese population from shifting around.

Half-a-century later, the Chinese government has begun exploring ways of changing the system to make it more equitable, as people with urban Hukou's enjoy more benefits than those with a rural registration.

So far, 15 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities have announced plans to cancel the rural Hukou registration.

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