BEIJING - Hu Jintao on Thursday emphasized the importance of ecological progress and advocated the building of a "beautiful" China in the country's overall development plan.

In his report to the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC), Hu said, "We must give high priority to making ecological progress, work hard to build a beautiful country, and achieve lasting and sustainable development of the Chinese nation."

Hu gave ecological progress a more prominent position by incorporating it into the country's overall development plan together with economic, political, cultural and social progress.

It is the first time that the concept of "beautiful China" has been written into the keynote report at the five-yearly CPC National Congress.

At the 17th CPC National Congress in 2007, Hu Jintao advocated ecological progress for the first time in his report. The term was also translated as "conservation culture" or "ecological civilization" in China's official documents.

When listing the difficulties and problems for China's development, Hu said unbalanced, uncoordinated and unsustainable development remains a big problem, and "resource and environmental constraints have become more serious."

To promote ecological progress, China will improve development of its geographical space, promote all-around resource conservation, intensify protection of the ecosystem and the environment, and enhance system building.

China has been aware of the severity of the burden of pollution and energy consumption amid its economic miracles over the past decades.

In 2008, the second year after ecological progress was written in the Party congress report, China elevated the State Environmental Protection Administration to a full-fledged ministry, which is tasked "to step up environmental improvement and ecological protection and accelerate the building of a resource-saving and environment-friendly society."

China also pledged in its 12th Five-Year Program to cut energy consumption per unit of GDP by 16 percent while slashing carbon emissions by 17 percent in the five years to 2015. That will help China meet its pledge of reducing carbon intensity by 40 to 45 percent by 2020 from the 2005 levels.

China's installed capacity of wind farms and the use of solar-powered water heater both topped the world.

Chen Baosheng, a Party congress delegate and vice president of Party School of the CPC Central Committee, said Hu's report elevates ecological progress to a higher strategic level.

The report stipulates that the overall approach to build socialism with Chinese characteristics is to promote economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological progress.

It shows China will pursue an energy-saving and environment-friendly development path featuring harmony between humans and nature, and will cast away the traditional path of extensive development, Chen said.

In his report, Hu Jintao called for efforts to keep more farmland for farmers, and leave to future generations a beautiful homeland with green fields, clean water and a blue sky.

Fan Hesheng, a sociologist from East China's Anhui province, said he is more than happy to see the wording "beautiful China" in a keynote political report of the ruling CPC, which reflects the Party's deepened understanding on the relationship between humans and nature.

The CPC shows the sense of responsibility for future generations and the world as well, Fan said.