Children and adults enrich their life at new bookstore at relocation site in Guangxi’s Shangsi county

Children read books attentively in the bookstore. (Photo courtesy of Shangsi county’s integrated media center)

A Xinhua Bookstore branch recently opened at a relocation site in Jiangping, Shangsi county in south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, as a move to supplement the county’s poverty alleviation efforts involving relocation of impoverished people from inhospitable areas.

The bookstore has attracted many locals at different ages. Tan Ziyuan, a woman who works at a poverty alleviation workshop, is one of them.

“I find a job near home, while my son can read books at the bookstore close to my workplace,” she said, adding that she can pick her son up after work.

Her five-year-old son, Ma Shaoxiang, comes to the bookstore on time every day, waiting for his mom to take him home after she is off duty.

To help improve local people’s employability and enrich their cultural life, a vocation training center and Party branch has also been set up at the relocation site by the organization department of the county’s Party committee.

While promoting poverty alleviation through the Party building at the relocation site, the department focuses on the bookstore to enrich people’s culture life, said Lao Shigeng, an official with the department.

On April 24, Shangsi’s Xinhua Bookstore donated about 10,000 yuan (1,400 dollars) worth of books, covering categories such as cultural education, science popularization and agricultural breeding, to help local residents build on their knowledge and skills.