BEIJING - China will give high priority to rural areas in developing infrastructure and social programs, Hu Jintao said on Thursday.

Expounding on the topic of integrating urban and rural development, Hu said resolving issues relating to agriculture, rural areas and farmers is the number one priority in the Party's work.

"We should better balance urban and rural development, boost rural development, work to narrow the gap between urban and rural areas, and promote their common prosperity," he said when delivering a keynote speech at the opening of the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC).

Hu said China should continue to encourage industry to support agriculture in return for agriculture's earlier contribution to its development and encourage cities to support rural areas.

"We should give more to farmers and take less from them and lift restrictions over their economic activities," he said.

He said policy support should be increased to boost agriculture, benefit farmers and increase rural prosperity, and encourage the rural population to participate in modernization on an equal footing and share in its fruits.

The country should speed up the development of modern agriculture, raise the overall production capacity of agriculture, and ensure food security and effective supply of major agricultural products in China, he said.

"We should work harder to build new rural areas, carry out programs of poverty alleviation through development and fully improve rural working and living conditions," he said.

Hu promised to protect in accordance with the law farmers' rights to farm the land they have contracted, to use the land on which their houses sit, and to share in the proceeds from rural collective operations.

"We should reform the land expropriation system and increase the share of gain in land value to farmers," he stressed.

"What we aim to achieve is a new type of relations between industry and agriculture and between urban and rural areas in which industry promotes agriculture, urban areas support rural development, agriculture and industry benefit each other, and there is integrated urban and rural development," Hu said.