Wu Bangguo (3rd R), Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, inspects Shanghai Zhenhua Port Machinery (Group) Company Ltd. in Shanghai, east China, April 21, 2006. Wu made an inspection tour in Shanghai on April 18-22. [Xinhua Photo]
Wu Bangguo (R Front), Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, inspects the Donghai Bridge in Shanghai, east China, April 19, 2006. [Xinhua Photo]
Wu Bangguo (2nd L Rear), Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, inspects Langxia Middle School in the Jinshan District of Shanghai, east China, April 20, 2006. [Xinhua Photo]
Wu Bangguo said Shanghai should lead the country in science innovation, industrial structure reform, and environmental protection as he concluded his five-day tour to the city.
Upon his arrival at Shanghai, China's economic hub, on April 18, Wu, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), visited Shanghai's commercial district, ports, and industrial bases for chemicals, machinery, and ship making.
With many colleges, science institutes, and big firms, Shanghai had prominent advantages at developing technology and could "make great progress in this regard," Wu said.
He asked local leaders to give high-tech firms more play in the market and offer incentives to technology specialties.
Wu also called for growing efforts in the next five years to develop the city's service industry, especially logistics, exhibition service, and services that offer convenience for the general public.
Traditional industries like textile sector, on the other hand, should eye for development at high ends, Wu said.
As for the deteriorating urban environment nationwide, Wu ordered Shanghai to pay close attention to environmental protection by shutting down polluting factories and vetoing any projects that might post environmental threats.
Shanghai should lead the country in urban environmental protection and prepare to hold the world expo in 2010 with good ecological conditions, he said.
During his stay, Wu also visited the countryside out in Shanghai's suburban area, searching ways to help the countryside catch up with the rapid development of Chinese cities.
In Langxia Village, a outlying village in Shanghai, Wu toured about farmland, schools, farm houses, and rural clinics, talking to local peasants and addressing their immediate needs.
The village, though relatively poor in Shanghai, is a modern and well-developed one compared to most of China's poor villages in inland provinces.
Hearing that a villager in Langxia could earn 7,000 yuan (864 U.S. dollars) annually, but 70 percent were coming from migrant labor in cities, Wu asked local officials to broaden money-earning channels for peasants and seek ways to increase their income.
"The countryside can only develop with peasants' pocket full," Wu said.
He also praised local officials' efforts to provide medical care, education, and expand arable farmland.
"We should consider peasants' opinions when we do things for them, instead of simply reforming for reform's sake," he said as he learnt a local project to move peasants to high-rise apartments from casually-dotted farm houses in order to make use of 1,200 mu (80 hectares) farmland. Local officials said 92 percent of local peasants were happy to sign contracts to move into new buildings.
"I believe rural life will have a big change in the coming five to ten years, with peasants living better and better, after the central government's weighty investment to develop the countryside," he said.
(Source: Xinhua News Agency)