Premier Li Keqiang urged local governments to push forward renovation of shanty towns at a national work conference on Saturday. "Renovation of shanty towns bears many low-income families' hopes for improving their living conditions and is also a focal point in pushing forward people-oriented urbanization," said Li in a written instruction.

Although progress has been made on this issue, challenges remain, Li said. He urged local governments at different levels to ramp up their efforts to improve the situation by providing financial and tax support, and creating new mechanisms for private capital to take part in the task.

At the Summer Davos this September, Li said that China will continue the large-scale renovation of shanty towns in the coming years. "In China 100 million people are living in shanty towns, and we must provide them with living conditions that meet modern standards."

China set the goal of constructing 36 million affordable houses between 2011 and 2015. Over the past four years, more than 20 million affordable apartments have been constructed nationwide, with a further 12 million under construction. Meanwhile, the assistance fund for building such homes has reached 710 billion yuan ($114 billion), data from the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development showed in May.