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 BEIJING (AP) - Chinese officials promised Wednesday to crack down on seizures of farmland for redevelopment that are fueling unrest, saying as many as 1 million farmers lose their land each year and are paid too little for it.
The government is facing increasingly violent protests by farmers who complain that officials are seizing farmland, paying them too little compensation, and then selling it at much higher prices to developers to build factories, shopping malls or other projects.
Officials are trying to defuse mounting anger in the countryside, home to some 800 million people, by promising to spend more on rural schools, health care and other aid to try to narrow the gap between China's rich and poor.
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