The fifth National Conference on Reading kicked off in Nanchang, the capital of Jiangxi province, on Monday, also heralding the launch of the first National Reading Week in China.

Those attending the conference, which runs through Wednesday, called for increased efforts to promote reading nationwide and foster a culture of reading across society.

Noting that reading is the most fundamental aspect of cultural development, they stressed the importance of fully leveraging nationwide reading initiatives as part of the broader drive to build a leading country in culture.

Li Shulei, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and head of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, attended the event and delivered a speech.

China's first National Reading Week is being observed through a series of events to ignite a passion for reading in society. It follows a State Council regulation that took effect on Feb 1 to promote reading among the public. Aimed at raising the intellectual, moral, scientific and cultural standards of the Chinese people and enhancing overall social civility, the regulation designated the fourth week of April as National Reading Week.

As part of the conference on reading, various forums are being held, targeting different fields and audiences. These include forums on youth reading, family and parent-child reading, library reading, rural reading, senior reading, reading rights protection, and digital reading.

Another highlight of the conference is a showcase of Jiangxi's traditional culture. An exhibition on ancient Chinese academy culture offers audiences an immersive experience, recreating the vibrant scholarly atmosphere of academies such as Bailudong and bringing these thousand-year-old institutions from history into the present. Other special activities include the Jiangxi School of Poetry classics exhibition and the Tengwang Pavilion Book Fair.

The 23rd National Reading Survey was released at the conference. It shows that in 2025, 82.3 percent of Chinese adults engaged in reading. On average, the combined reading volume of paper books and e-books per person reached 8.39, marking an increase from the previous year. Among minors aged 0 to 17, 86.7 percent read books, and 75.9 percent engaged in digital reading, both figures up from the previous year.

Meanwhile, the National Digital Reading Report, which was also released at the conference, shows that by the end of 2025, the total number of digital works in China had reached 70.5592 million, an increase of 11.87 percent from 2024, reflecting a robust supply of content. The total number of digital works released overseas — including translations, original overseas works and e-books — was 949,200, a year-on-year increase of 17.42 percent. In 2025, the number of digital reading users in China stood at 689 million, up 2.95 percent year-on-year.

At a reading event on "red classics" organized by the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles in Nanchang, Liu Lanfang, a performing artist with 67 years of experience in pingshu — a traditional form of storytelling — shared her passion for reading, storytelling and writing. Spending several hours a day reading on her phone, Liu said she believes that "one should always read. Reading expands knowledge, and that's how people can keep improving".

Meanwhile, at a separate book sharing event for children in Nanchang, Wang Kai, a popular storyteller known as Uncle Kai, stressed the importance of reading for children in the era of artificial intelligence.

"In the AI era, we need a broader perspective on reading. Children need a solid foundation of common knowledge, and the best way to gain that is through reading," he said.