China has canceled over 1,000 types of fees paid by taxi drivers to streamline the industry and lighten taxi drivers' burden, according to the State Council here Thursday.

Since the beginning of the year, a total of 1,052 kinds of fees, involving 1.311 billion yuan (168 million U.S. dollars) annually, have been canceled in measures to improve the legal rights of taxi drivers, sources with the State Council said.

A taxi driver's monthly operating income is around 19,500 yuan (2,500 U.S. dollars), leasing fees paid to the cab companies are around 9,300 yuan, fuel costs about 5,328 yuan and monthly salaries 2,436 yuan, according to figures from Guangzhou Municipality last April.

Previously, taxi drivers had to pay a lot of money to cab companies to have the right to legally operate a taxi. Most of these practices have now been terminated.

However, some murky transactions continue. Since March, 1,266 cases of transfer of taxi operating rights have been investigated, involving 48,800 taxis.

The government also subsidizes fuel costs for taxi drivers -- Beijing taxi drivers, for example, have received a subsidy of 150 yuan (19.23 U.S. dollars) per month since April 2006.

In recent years, the working conditions of taxi drivers have deteriorated due to the high administrative fees, increased fuel costs and terrible traffic jams.

The government dissuades people from working more than eight hours a day, but taxi drivers have to work overtime to earn an average of about 2,000 yuan a month.

"The first eight hours we work for others and the rest of time we work for ourselves," said a taxi driver from Yangzhou city.

Since October 2005, taxi drivers in 17 Chinese cities including Nanchang and Yinchuan have gone on strike to protest about bad working conditions.

Editor: Yan