Country and Sector Background Sichuan Province is a traditionally agricultural region in south-central China, home to some 82 million people. The central government's policy between 1987 and 1992 of providing incentives for growth in coastal areas left inland provinces such as Sichuan behind. However, recent attention to the resulting regional income disparities has prompted the government to promote economic incentives and infrastructure investments in the inland areas.
More recent estimates show continued strong growth.
Sichuan's capital, Chengdu City, forms part of an emerging urban industrial corridor which stretches southeast as far as the newly-designated municipality of Chongqing, now the world's largest single urban center. Sichuan's economic growth in terms of industrial and agricultural production has come at the cost of increased pollution of its water and land resources. Pollution is concentrated in Sichuan's two major river basins, the Min and the Tuo, both of which drain into the Yangtze River. Wastewater discharges from urban areas contribute substantially to pollution loads. Development in this corridor attracts migrant workers from the surrounding villages, who typically take low income jobs and do not have legal urban registrations.