China will fully guarantee the timely payment of future pensions and sustainable healthy operation of the basic pension system, a government official has said. This is the second time since last April that the government has given the reassurance.

An official from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security (MOHRSS) said this in response to a report on 8 July by China Times, a local newspaper, that said that the government-run basic pension fund will be depleted by 2035, and that those born in the 1980s could be the first generation who would not receive a full pension upon retirement.

The report cited research by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences released in April that forecast that the urban worker pension fund would be emptied by 2035. At that time, the MOHRSS had said that the "the central government can fully guarantee the pension funds will be paid on time and in full".

China is promoting a series of reform measures to ensure the sustainable and healthy development of the pension system, such as transferring equity in state owned enterprises to the basic pension fund.

Yet, the government has ordered the reduction of pension contributions in a bid to help businesses ease costs in an economic slowdown. This month, the government slashed the employers’ pension contribution rate of as high as 20% of each employee’s salary to 16%. The move, however, will cut the basic pension fund’s income but the government said it would increase the income through tapping other sources to offset the impact.