Wuhan strives to build itself youth-attractive city

On March 19, Wuhan city in Central China's Hubei province approved the "2025 List of Practical Projects for Youth", providing a clear roadmap toward making the city more livable, work-friendly, and talent-attractive.

The list includes 66 initiatives across areas such as youth innovation and entrepreneurship, social integration and participation, social security, education, health, and the protection of youth rights.

Wuhan will establish specialized parks, such as the Wuhan Digital Creative Industry Park and the Yangtze River Digital Culture Industry Park, to support youth innovation and entrepreneurship in 2025. These parks will harness young people's innovative power to develop digital content industries like e-sports, animation, online streaming, and short videos.

Focusing on technological innovation and key industry sectors, the city plans to support 300 outstanding entrepreneurial projects by recent graduates (within five years) and current students. To attract more tech teams and projects to Wuhan, over 500 million yuan ($68.91 million) in "Youth Innovation Loans" will be issued.

To address housing needs, Wuhan will construct and allocate over 54,000 units of affordable rental housing and build 28 youth communities, providing at least 20,000 housing units.

The city will also repurpose idle spaces to create 100 "small and beautiful" urban public spaces, such as pocket parks and neighborhood plazas. It will develop distinctive food streets, establish 50 new "15-minute convenience circles", and open over 200 new branded convenience stores, ensuring young people enjoy good food, comfortable living, and vibrant leisure activities.

Wuhan aims to lead cities nationwide in youth employment, education, and health metrics by 2026. The city expects significant improvements in youth participation and contributions to Wuhan's high-quality development and modernization efforts.