The Chinese government will appropriate over 1 billion yuan (120 million U.S. dollars) to increase the wages of the rural laborers working on the construction of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway this year.

The special fund, to be used to ensure the living and working conditions of rural laborers, will be the same as the sum enjoyed by employees of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway Company, said Lu Chunfang, chief official in charge of the construction.

A new policy says that each rural laborer is entitled to a food subsidy of 10 yuan (1.2 dollars) per day.

Those who work on construction sites below 4,000 meters above sea level will get a daily salary of at least 50 yuan, while workers on sites from 4,000 to 4,500 meters will receive at least 55 yuan, and above 4,500 meters 60 yuan, according to the policy.

Furthermore, the Headquarters of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway Construction is making efforts to provide health insurance for more than 30,000 workers on the project and at present all the workers, including rural laborers, enjoy free medical treatment.

To prevent them from catching severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), the headquarters ordered that only workers from the Qinghai Province and the Tibet Autonomous Region could stay at the construction sites and the free medicine to build up resistance to SARS should be dispensed as soon as possible. Qinghai and Tibet have not yet been hit by SARS.

Formally started in 2001, the railway project is expected to cost a total of 36 billion yuan (4.34 billion U.S. dollars) and is scheduled to complete by 2007, making it China's first railway linking Tibet and the rest of the country.

With a length of 1,118 kilometers, the railway will link Golmud, a traffic hub in the Qinghai Province, with Lhasa, the regional capital of Tibet.