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)