President Hu Jintao
on Thursday urged governments at all levels to invest more and work
harder to modernize agriculture and make breakthroughs in new
relationships between industry and agriculture, and between urban
and rural areas.
This is imperative for "laying a solid foundation for the
building of a new socialist countryside" in the country, Hu said at
a lecture attended by members of the Political Bureau of the
Communist Party of China (CPC)
Central Committee.
Hu, also general secretary of the CPC Central Committee,
highlighted the importance of rural development in China where
rural residents constitute the majority of its population of 1.3
billion.
"If we cannot succeed in developing agriculture and rural areas
while helping farmers to improve their lives, we will fail to reach
the goal of building a prosperous society in an all-round way and
realizing modernization for the country, prosperity for all and the
lasting political stability of the nation," he said.
Despite the progress in developing agriculture and rural areas
and improving the people's living standards, "we must be aware of
the major contradictions and problems we are faced with," Hu
stressed.
He urged Party and government officials across the country to go
to the grassroots level to listen to farmers' ideas and proposals,
and set development targets and measures according to local
conditions, with emphasis placed on the fundamental interests of
the rural population.
Two research fellows from the Ministry of Agriculture and the
Chinese Academy of Social Sciences were invited to give their views
on building a new socialist countryside.
(Xinhua News Agency January 27, 2006)