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From the People: How did a poor Chinese county get out of its economic predicament?
02:23

In the 1970s and 1980s, Zhengding in north China's Hebei Province was well-known as a county that remained poor, despite high levels of grain production. Although grain yield per mu (0.067 hectares) exceeded 500 kilograms, people in Zhengding were impoverished. Facing this imbalance between output and local conditions, how did the county get out of its economic predicament? 

From 1982 to 1985, Xi Jinping served as deputy secretary and then secretary of Zhengding County Party Committee. In 1984, taking advantage of local features and circumstances, Xi proposed the development of different operational modes and created a "semi-suburban" economy, which improved the lives of the local people and the overall economic conditions of the county.

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