Wu Renbao's unremitting efforts to improve the lives of his fellow villagers during his 40-year tenure as Party chief of Huaxi Village in Jiangsu Province have shown him to be a loyal and devoted public servant.

Under his leadership, the village has made astonishing economic progress. The villagers have not just got off the poverty treadmill but they have become astonishingly well-off. By converting their commune into a unique form of cooperative joint-stock company, they have achieved incomes comparable to those in the developed world. Almost every family lives in a modern house with every sort of modern household appliance. Huaxi has been tagged the "Top Village in China" and its development is regarded as an economic miracle.

Wu, born in 1928, has been a delegate to two Communist Party National Congresses and is an elected deputy to the National People's Congress (NPC), China's parliament. He has received the "National Model Worker" twice and was listed among the "Top National Contributors to Poverty-Alleviation".