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Speaking for farmers, Hu Huishu, 43, felt a strong sense of responsibility at the local annual legislative session in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality. "As a farmer and lawmaker, I must defend the interests of all farmers in the municipality," said Hu, who was elected a deputy to the fifth Chongqing Municipal People's Congress in 2017.
"I also care about those disadvantaged groups such as the elderly and the disabled, because I am one of them," she said.
Hu was crippled due to illness at the age of six. Her husband suffered from tuberculosis, which ate through all of their savings and ran up a lot of debt. "After learning that honey could relieve my husband's cough, I decided to keep bees because honey was too expensive for us at that time."
Her husband is not the only one that Hu has been taking care of since 2017. She helps the farmers in her home village fight against poverty with her beekeeping skills and protects the interests of all farmers in the city.
In 2018, Hu's proposal to expand the coverage of nursing subsidies for the disabled promoted the improvement of living subsidies for the disabled and nursing subsidies for the severely disabled in Chongqing.
"I felt both excitement and a strong sense of responsibility to defend the interests of farmers and disadvantaged groups as a deputy to the congress," she said.
"People are willing to tell me their joys and sorrows because they trust me," said Zhou Zewu, another deputy to the Chongqing Municipal People's Congress. "It's my honor to represent them."
As a part of the young generation, 29-year-old Qiu Gongcheng, another farmer and deputy to the congress, likes communicating with young farmers online. "More and more young people are willing to talk with me as they know more about my job," Qiu said.
Qiu proposed to make a long-term plan for industrial development in rural areas and build a system of integrated development of the primary, secondary and tertiary industries at the legislative session. "I have a lot of new ideas about the future development of rural areas," he said.
Among more than 800 deputies to the fifth Chongqing Municipal People's Congress, 293 are farmers, workers and technicians, accounting for about 34 percent of the total.
In China, the organs through which the people exercise state power are the National People's Congress and the local people's congresses at all levels.
The system of people's congresses is China's fundamental political system which upholds the organic unity of Party leadership, the running of the country by the people, and law-based governance.
