President Xi Jinping has highlighted the importance of accelerating the development of a modern vocational education system and cultivating more high-caliber technical professionals as China moves toward socialist modernization.

Xi, who is also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, underlined the promising future and greater potential of vocational education in an instruction published on Tuesday.

He urged steady progress in developing undergraduate programs for vocational education, building a group of top-notch vocational institutions and programs, promoting the integration between vocational and general education and making vocational education more adaptive.

It is important to adhere to the Party's leadership, follow the correct path of running schools, persist in fostering virtues through education and refine the orientation of vocational education, he said.

He called for steps to deepen the integration of vocational education with industries, promote cooperation between colleges and businesses and move forward with reform in training and schooling models, as well as management and support mechanisms.

Party committees and government departments at various levels must enhance institutional innovation and scale up policy support and investment to give play to fine workmanship and lift the social status of technical professionals, he said.

In doing so, strong talent and skills support can be provided for the building of a modern socialist China and the realization of the Chinese dream of national rejuvenation, he added.

Premier Li Keqiang said in an instruction that it is important to focus on serving the nation's modernization drive and promoting high-quality development in striving to develop a high-level technical talent training system.

Aiming at the forefront of technological change and industrial upgrading, more efforts are needed to attract more young people to vocational education, Li said.

It is important to boost the competence of educators and educational conditions, improve teaching materials and ways of teaching and explore the development of an apprenticeship system with Chinese characteristics, he said.

The instructions came as a national conference on vocational education was held in Beijing on Monday and Tuesday.

Vice-Premier Sun Chunlan said at the conference that the nation should accelerate the development of a modern vocational education system, bolster the quality of training and improve the treatment of professional talents.