Documentary covers China's reform, opening-up

A documentary marking the 40th anniversary of China's reform and opening-up is garnering a global audience, especially in Asian countries, industry insiders say.

The three-episode series, How China Made It, is airing on the Discovery Channel in more than 200 countries. Through interviews, the documentary looks back at how China has changed over the past 40 years and what the country has accomplished during that time.

The series began on Dec 15 on Discovery and China's streaming media service Youku and runs for two weeks. It was jointly produced by China Intercontinental Communication Center, Youku, the Discovery Channel and the United Kingdom-based independent production company Meridian Line Films.

Wang Yuanyuan, director of the film and video production center at the China Intercontinental Communication Center says that quality programs like this one are able to cross cultures and attract audiences both in China and overseas.

Tony Qiu, vice-president for China and South Korea for Discovery, said that China's global audience is interested in the country's economic development, as previous programs about China have all received very high ratings.

"Audiences in Asia are especially interested in these stories, as they are geographically close to China and have close economic connections with it," he says. "Western audiences also pay a lot of attention to China," Qiu says.

He says the series is important because some global audiences have an outdated impression of the country. These documentaries are important in terms of learning about modern China, he says.

The first episode, Love of the Land, dives deep into the lives of people in China's rural regions and explores, through personal stories, how reform and opening-up has changed the lives of farming families, from the beginning of the household responsibility system in 1978 to today.

The second episode, Chasing Dreams, tells the stories of entrepreneurs, the businesspeople, the industrialists, both large and small, who jumped at new opportunities that were created by the different policies in the reform era.

The third episode, Future Focused, explores the many ways that daily lives have continued to change since 1978, including in education, travel, and health.

chenyingqun@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 12/21/2018 page3)