The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), the country's ruling party, and the State Council, China's cabinet, jointly released a document in late January, detailing their efforts to intensify the construction of a new socialist countryside during 2007 and beyond. As the fourth consecutive document dealing with issues of rural development released by the central authorities since 2004, it may serve as a blueprint for long-term development in this area.

While the previous documents have emphasized raising farmers' income, boosting agricultural production and listing the requirements to build the countryside, the latest document sets agricultural modernization as the top priority and suggests how to achieve this target. This includes increasing public spending on farm production and rural development, upgrading agricultural machinery and infrastructure, and providing extensive education and training programs for farmers-all prerequisites for the nation's rural revival in the 21st century.

The release of the document coincides with the improved general situation in rural China. Grain output has risen for three years in a row and is expected to top 490 billion kg last year. The income of local farmers has posted 6 percent growth for the third year -up by 1,000 yuan--and an ever increasing number of infrastructure projects and social welfare programs have been introduced. Even more encouraging is the buoyant mood of rural inhabitants, brought about largely through the removal of agricultural tax and the supply of direct subsidies and easily accessible loans to farmers.

Despite this optimism, there remain several barriers to transforming China's countryside. First, the inadequate agricultural infrastructure and outmoded technologies; second, the slow pace of income growth and limited employment opportunities for farmers as compared with urban dwellers; third, the run-off of land, fresh water and other farming resources, caused by rapid industrial and urban growth; and fourth, the lack of rural social welfare undertakings, such as medical care, education and necessary provision for the aged. Allied to these barriers is the critical shortage of skilled farm labor, as more than 100 million farmers have now found their way to urban areas to seek opportunities.

These are the fundamental harsh realities that drove the Chinese central authorities to issue the above-mentioned documents to attain the goal set in the 11th National Five-Year Plan (2006-10).

What, then, is the vision of the new socialist countryside? It has been summed up in a CPC plenary session bulletin as one with "expanded farm production, a better life for all, improved social disposition and good moral standards, clean and orderly neighborhood, and democracy in village administration." Needless to say, given the current state of China's vast rural region, this is neither a quick fix nor an easy job, and will doubtless face a great many challenges in the years to come.

A basically agricultural nation with over 60 percent of its 1.3 billion population in the countryside, China has no option but to forge ahead with this task, regardless of the difficulties and costs. It's the right move toward the grand plan of building a more harmonious society.