More than 500 village heads from around China gathered
Saturday?in Dazhai, a well-known village in Shanxi
Province, to exchange views on building harmonious rural
communities.
The three-day national forum on rural communities construction
is aimed to promote exchanges and cooperation among the rural areas
in east, central and west China, according to the organizing
committee.
The participants will also touch such topics as how to build
industrialized villages with distinct characteristics and how rich
villages join hands with poor ones in poverty reduction.
As representatives of the 5 million "officials" of 680,000
villages across China, the participants are expected to ink a joint
communiqués of Chinese village heads.
Some 200 experts and scholars of rural development and
agriculture officials will also attend the forum.
Founded in 2000, the forum is aimed at providing a platform for
exchange of experience among the village heads throughout the
country so as to increase the influence of the countryside on
government policy making.
(Xinhua News Agency September 4, 2005)