WITHIN a week of an East Chinese city posting job vacancies for “village CEOs,” more than 90 candidates submitted their applications, Xinhua reported Thursday.

The advertisement, published by Yuhang District in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, aims to recruit six business leaders to enhance the local rural economy. The job offers an annual salary starting at 180,000 yuan (US$25,023) with additional benefits like social insurance and housing subsidies. In comparison, the average annual salary for a civil servant in Chinese cities was 120,698 yuan in 2023.

Applicants must be under the age of 40, hold a bachelor’s degree or higher, and possess a minimum of three years of work experience in business management, investment, or finance.

Yu Huafen, an official from Yuhang’s agriculture and rural affairs bureau, explained that the village CEO's job responsibilities include planning and supervising a village’s agricultural and economic activities. Acknowledged as a new profession in China by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security in 2019, the goal is to attract fresh talent and enhance village economic governance efficiency by drawing on corporate governance practices.

Yuhang has appointed 34 village CEOs with an average age of 36. These CEOs have overseen 122 projects, attracted 299 million yuan in investments, and generated revenues exceeding 100 million yuan.

One such village CEO is Liu Song, originally from eastern Anhui Province, now working in Yong’an Village in Yuhang since 2020. Growing up in a rural environment, Liu holds a bachelor’s degree in agriculture from Zhejiang University.

In 2022, Liu helped establish a family farm cooperative managing over 86.67 hectares of rice paddies in the 3,100-resident village. This September, he assisted locals in setting up a rice wine factory and marketed the wines through e-commerce, reaching over 6,000 customers in two months. While the average Yong’an villager earned 63,000 yuan annually in 2023, Liu’s earnings totaled around 300,000 yuan.

By the end of 2023, the recruitment and training program for village CEOs expanded to at least 125 counties, cities, and districts across provinces like Zhejiang, Guangdong, and Yunnan.

Li Xiaoyun, a professor at China Agricultural University, said that improved infrastructure and emerging opportunities in rural areas have enticed college graduates to consider jobs outside major cities.(Xinhua)