Villages targeted for transparent reform

The country has launched a national campaign to strengthen democratic management and boost transparency among about 30,000 villages, senior officials said Friday.

The three-year campaign, led by the National Information Openness Team of Village Affairs under the Ministry of Civil Affairs (MOCA), aims to resolve rural disputes and conflicts by safeguarding farmers' rights of knowing and monitoring, said Huang Guanhong, an official in the department of local governance and community construction of MOCA.

The move comes as a result of the circular issued recently by 12 ministries in an effort to "achieve a fundamental change of challenged villages in three years".