Project Hope, which pools donations to help rural impoverished school-age children to complete primary school education, has assisted 2.6 million needy students in China since the China Youth Development Foundation (CYDF) launched the charity program on Oct. 30, 1989.

The project has received donations valued at 2.5 billion yuan (302 million US dollars) from at home and abroad over the past 15 years. With these donations, 11,266 "Hope" primary schools have been built, enabling 2.6 million needy students to receive education.

According to CYDF statistics, 80 percent of the beneficiaries of Project Hope are in the impoverished areas in central and west China. Two and a half primary schools out of every 100 in rural areas are "Hope" primary schools on average.

The influence of the project continues to spread among Chinese. A survey conducted by the National Research Center for Science and Technology for Development in 29 provincial capital cities shows that 93.9 percent of Chinese citizens above the age of 16 know about Project Hope, and 63.5 percent of them have participated in it in various ways.

Since Jan. 1, 2003, the CYDF began to use uniform receipts for donations to Project Hope. The foundation also opened personal accounts in the Agriculture Bank of China for the beneficiaries of the project, enabling the needy students to draw the money directly through local branches of the bank.

(Xinhua News Agency October 30, 2004)