Integration of culture in sustainable development policies

In recent years, the Chinese government has emphasized coordinated development of the economy, society, politics, culture and ecology, as well as the integration of cultural development with that of other relevant industries. In order to better integrate cultural development with that of tourism, the Ministry of Culture in conjunction with the National Tourism Administration issued the Guidance to Promote Joint Development of Culture and Tourism in August 2009.

China has made continuous efforts to improve network infrastructure, aiming to proactively boost development of the information industry. In recent years, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has been working hard to implement the “All Villages Connected by Telephone” project. Statistics for the end of 2011 show telephone service availability in 100% of administrative villages, and 94.6% for natural villages. In addition all villages and townships in China have Internet access and 84% of administrative villages have broadband. Meanwhile, China’s telecommunication regulators have been vigorously improving information infrastructure. By the end of 2010, China had a total of 9,962,000 km of communications and optical cables, and a total international bandwidth of 1.6Tbps. 620,000 3G base stations have been established, and 3G coverage extends to all cities, counties and main townships and villages.

The Chinese government has attached great importance to the cultural cause of the blind, and has taken various steps to ensure that they enjoy a good education and share of cultural achievements. China’s 12.33 million visually handicapped people make up 14.86% of the total number of its handicapped. There are another 4.58 million people with multiple impairments including a visual one. China has established a National Braille Press to provide rich and diverse Braille reading materials for the visually handicapped. Since 2006, this Press has published 2,215 Braille titles, including 575 textbooks and guidance books. In addition 815 audio books of various types and 50 large-character book editions are published for the blind. With strong weight and support from the Chinese government, the China Braille Library (China Culture and Information Service Center of the Visually Handicapped) is now complete and in operation, spanning 28,000 square meters.