The Chinese government says telecom operators and service providers should increase their broadband investment in rural areas.
Speaking at the Broadband World Forum Asia, Jiang Yaoping, deputy minister at China's Ministry of Information Industry, says there is still a big gap between rural and urban areas in broadband development, in infrastructure, content and applications.
Despite this, there is great demand for broadband services and applications in rural areas, which he says also presents huge potential for telecom operators and service providers.
Over the next few years, China will also put more efforts in the development broadband content and applications, for rural areas.
"Broadband is about data service, and we have been actively exploring the development of applications for rural users like farmers,' he says.
According to the MII, China has 144 million Internet users, 97 million of which are broadband users, making China as the second largest market by subscribers after the US.