Ms Youyun Zhang: I am very glad to be back home. I left Xiaodongmen 57 years ago, graduating from high school in Wuhan, leaving for Beijing to go to college and then have been working outside ever since, 57 years has passed by already, so my feeling to come back to hometown and see all the folks here is beyond words.
Now we are living in a fast-changing era,with undergoing the acceleration process of new-style urbanization as well as the profound social and economic revolution, thus we do face vital opportunities of development. For more than 10 years, Tanhualin has gone through tremendous changes with the support of the Wuchang District Committee, the People’s Government of Wuchang as well as the continuous effort from Tanhualin neighborhood committees and all the stakeholders.
As a Wuhan local,my understanding for Tanhualin is far from enough.Only until this year did I realize that the neighborhood where I spent more than 10 years of my youth time has such profound accumulation of social human culture, whose historical value plays a vital part to the current and future development of people’s life here.
Therefore, today’s seminar, which is organized by Wuchang District Committee, the People’s Government of Wuchang should be very interesting. We have invited two experts to speak today, one is the chief expert of the Sino-EU urbanization partnership project, Mr Nicolai Peitersen,who is a very knowledgeable man that has published many of his works,and has been involved in many researches and practices in urbanization. The other one is a senior researcher on urbanization, Mr Jinkui Li, who is a great combination of both passion and profession, who is a thinker and a man of action. In this occasion, let us look back to the history and reorganize our thoughts then collectively make a strategy plan for this project.
Indeed this is a great opportunity for study together, but we should be practical at the same time. For a seminar is not a meeting where you can get all the answers, this is more of a meeting to stimulate and broaden our views, give us more inspiration and thoughts thus to form more innovative and creative ideas, There is never a ready answer in anyone’s words, for the path is right under our feet.
Tanhualin is a place of treasure which carries such a long and complicated history. Thus we need to discover its value together. First let’s welcome senior researcher, Mr Jinkui Li with his passionate speech! Welcome!