Starting next year, Shanghai will subsidize families choosing a sea burial by 1,000 yuan and the another 1,000 yuan will go to pay service providers to cover costs such as ship tickets and insurance, Lu Chunling, director of funeral management under Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau, said on Tuesday.
"Those opting for burial at sea will save 1 square meter of land in Shanghai, and that would cost about 24,000 yuan if it was a burial plot," said Lu.
With an increasingly elderly population and 110,000 deaths annually, Shanghai authorities and cemetery operators have been promoting sea burials since 1991.
However, most people still shun the option because it is traditionally believed that the soul can find peace only when the body is buried on land.
According to Wu Xiaogang, a manager at the Shanghai Funeral and Interment Service Center, only around 2,000 people were buried at sea in 2012, about 1.8 percent of all burials.
"Sea burials in Shanghai have increased by 5 to 8 percent each year since 1991," said Lu. The local government offered a 200 yuan subsidy for each sea burial from 2002 and raised the amount to 400 yuan in 2007.
Lu said that even though the new subsidy applies from 2013, those who held sea burials in 2012 could still claim the money.
People in Hainan enjoy warm weather
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