Interview: Foreign student shows concerns over environmental issues

The annual sessions of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's Parliament, and the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the top political advisory body, opened on March 5 and 3, respectively.

People's Daily Online interviewed Vytautas Rimkus, a postgraduate student at Nankai University, who has been in China for six months. Though he's from Lithuania, he has spent quiet some years in UK studying his major in East Asian Business at the University of Sheffield.

The following is the interview with Vytautas.

People's Daily Online: What do you know about the National People's Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the two political annual sessions of China?

Vytautas Rimkus: I know that the NPC is the most important state mechanism in the PRC with the Standing Committee at the top. It has the power to change the constitution, elect the leaders of the state, and choose and approve country's developmental plans amongst other things. The CPPCC is an advisory political body consisting of primarily CCP members and affiliated parties, plus some independent members, which are mainly renowned public figures given places in the CPPCC as a badge of honor.

People's Daily Online: Are you interested in the sessions of NPC and CPPCC? Why?

Vytautas Rimkus: Yes. As a student in China I obviously have plans to tie my future with this country, so things discussed and decisions made by the NPC and CPPCC will most likely have some impact in my own future.

People's Daily Online: The 2013 sessions of NPC and CPPCC are the first national political sessions after the leadership transition of the Communist Party of China during the 18th National Congress of the CPC. What topics concern you the most?

Vytautas Rimkus: I am mostly interested in three issues: What steps will be taken for China to become a more advanced economy, what measures will the party take to work on rising income inequality and how the government plans to solve the environmental issues.

People's Daily Online: In recent years some foreign consular officials, executives and experts have been invited to attend the provincial NPC and CPPCC sessions. What do you think about this?

Vytautas Rimkus: I think this is an initiative showing that China is not a closed and backwards country which is opposite to what some people abroad imagine it to be.

People's Daily Online: What are the most satisfactory and the most dissatisfactory aspects in your daily life in China in recent years?

Vytautas Rimkus: I think that the satisfactory aspects are: Chinese people are incredibly friendly to foreigners, and they are very hard working and motivated people. China has an amazing culture, and has developed in an astonishing fast speed in recent decades.

The dissatisfactory aspects in my opinion are: the pollution, other environment issue and some hidden fees for consumers when trading.

People's Daily Online: What do your friends think about the annual political sessions of NPC and CPPCC?

Vytautas Rimkus: I have not had a chance to talk about it with my friends, but I believe my foreign friends would agree with most things I mentioned.