National efforts to vitalize countryside get added boost

China will continue to stress the vitalization and development of rural areas, as it is of great importance to national development.

According to the report delivered by Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, at the opening session of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, rural vitalization work will continue in order to prioritize rural development, consolidate ongoing poverty alleviation achievements and shore up national agricultural capabilities.

The report said that developing rural areas remains the most challenging, arduous task in the central government's aim of achieving the national goal of a modern socialist country. Doing so requires that the government move faster to vitalize businesses, talent, culture, ecosystems and organizations in rural areas.

Yang Xueshan, co-founder of Tsingpu, a tourism company in Beijing, said that the countryside is the cornerstone of the nation and the origin of culture, and it plays an important role in the development of tourism.

"I've read data showing that the rural population dropped to 36.11 percent of the total population in 2021. That number was 89.36 percent in 1949, when the People's Republic of China was founded," he said. "The decrease shows population and talent flowing from the countryside to urban areas, which has affected the development of the countryside."

He said that in the past few years, his company has introduced resources to help college students pay their fees and villagers increase their incomes by developing agricultural and tourism initiatives.

For example, one of Tsingpu's associated companies in Hainan province joined forces with a local investment company and signed a cooperation contract with Shougong village in late 2019.

The two companies rented roughly 28 hectares of land from the village to grow rice and passion fruit. The local government also invested 2 million yuan ($273,000) in the effort.

Since June 2020, the village has netted a profit of 322,000 yuan, and the project has provided work for 982 formerly impoverished villagers.

Over the past five years, increasing emphasis has been placed on the development of rural areas and on rural vitalization initiatives.

For example, the State Council, China's Cabinet, released a five-year plan on rural vitalization in 2018 as part of the efforts to achieve the national principle of developing a moderately prosperous society in all respects. The plan also laid a solid foundation for the modernization of agricultural and rural areas.