The township of Huaxi in the Yangtze River delta is a proud symbol of how Chinese communists embraced capitalism to lift 300 million people out of poverty during the past three decades.
Its leaders took a farm community with bamboo huts and ox carts in the 1970s and transformed it into an industrial and commercial powerhouse where today many of its 30,000 residents live in mansions and most have a car. Income of 80,000 yuan ($13,000) a head - almost four times the national average - allows Huaxi to claim it is China's richest village.
Huaxi is also emblematic of the country's construction and real estate boom. Communist Party officials there are building one of the world's 30 tallest buildings, a 2.5 billion yuan, 328-metre tower. Read more.
Its leaders took a farm community with bamboo huts and ox carts in the 1970s and transformed it into an industrial and commercial powerhouse where today many of its 30,000 residents live in mansions and most have a car. Income of 80,000 yuan ($13,000) a head - almost four times the national average - allows Huaxi to claim it is China's richest village.
Huaxi is also emblematic of the country's construction and real estate boom. Communist Party officials there are building one of the world's 30 tallest buildings, a 2.5 billion yuan, 328-metre tower. Read more.