US visitors keen to do their part in promoting friendship between the two countries
A group of guests from the US state of Iowa visit the Xiong'an New Area in Hebei province, July 2, 2023. (PHOTO / HEBNEWS.CN)
The futuristic configuration and construction efficiency of the Xiong’an New Area in Hebei province highly impressed a group of guests from the US state of Iowa who visited the area recently.
The group’s members — some of whom have been acquaintances of President Xi Jinping’s since the 1980s — visited the province from July 1 to 3. This year marks the 40th anniversary of Iowa’s sisterhood with the province in North China.
In 1985, Xi, then secretary of the Communist Party of China Zhengding county committee in Hebei, led a delegation to Iowa for a two-week visit that paved the way for a slew of memorable interactions between the two nations in the decades to come.
Last month, some of those Iowa friends got the chance to visit Xiong’an during their first trip to Hebei since the outbreak of COVID-19 three years ago interrupted travel.
On April 1, 2017, China announced plans to establish Xiong’an as a new economic zone about 100 kilometers southwest of Beijing, to relieve Beijing of functions not essential to its role as the nation’s capital and to advance the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region.
“The size of the buildings and the green space show that a lot of thought went into making the city of the future and how people want to live,” said Gary Dvorchak, managing director of Blueshirt Group Asia.
His parents, Eleanor and Thomas Dvorchak, hosted Xi during his 1985 visit to Muscatine, Iowa. The Dvorchaks’ house has been designated by Muscatine as the Sino-US Friendship House.
The Iowa guests visited Xiong’an’s center for planning and exhibition and the comprehensive service center of Xiong’an’s startup area. They listened to briefings by local officials about the city’s overall planning.
They also witnessed the progress of infrastructure construction and the building of a smart city in Xiong’an’s Rongdong area. In addition, they toured the scenic Baiyangdian Lake to view the lucid waters there and the progress made in ecological preservation and restoration.
Recalling the tour, Dvorchak said Xiong’an is “very modern and forward thinking”, with a scale that is highly livable.
The US guests, including Rick Kimberley, a farmer at Kimberley Family Farm, also visited Tayuanzhuang village in Zhengding county to see for themselves how China’s ambition for rural vitalization is being translated into reality.
The photo shows an aerial view of a business service center in Xiong'an New Area, Hebei province. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
Yin Jiping, the village’s Party chief, briefed them on plans for development of the village, including the blueprint for the agriculture and tourism sectors and social services for senior citizens.
Kimberley said, “The development of the agricultural industry has been something that you can be proud of.”
In 2012, Xi, then China’s vice-president, visited Kimberley’s farm and rode a tractor with him.
Luca Berrone, a board member of Iowa Sister States and a businessman, helped arrange the schedule for Xi’s five-person delegation during the Iowa visit in 1985.
“The two weeks I spent together with President Xi and the other members of the delegation proved to be a life-changing experience for me, and continue to be a source of inspiration for improving relationships,” he said.
Guests such as Berrone voiced their hopes and personal willingness to work towards enhancing subnational-level contacts and exchanges between the two largest economies in the world and to help improve the two nations’ strained relations.
“We must continue to invest in friendship, because we cannot ever take it for granted,” Berrone said.
Boosting networking between the younger generations of the two countries was also high on their agenda.
During their Hebei trip, the US guests visited Shijiazhuang Foreign Language School and attended a dialogue with students and faculty members there.
At the dialogue, students asked questions about the friendship between the people of China and the US, global agricultural issues, and exchanges between young Chinese and Americans.
Kenneth Quinn, former president of the World Food Prize Foundation and former US ambassador to Cambodia, responded to the students’ questions.
Quinn hosted Xi in 1985, and in 1980, he helped arrange a tour of Iowa for a Chinese delegation headed by Xi’s father, Xi Zhongxun, who was then governor of Guangdong province.
Quinn underlined the need to encourage future generations to continue with the friendship.
“It’s so important to have these exchanges for young students, and some exchanges allow Chinese students to come and spend a year going to high school someplace in the United States,” Quinn said.
He said such visits make the students ‘feel enough a part of America that a bond is formed’. “And I think it would be the same sending Americans to China, and feeling those attachments,” he added.
Luo Yu and Stephanie Stone contributed to this story.
