The Top 10 of China's most favorite "home-made"cartoons were announced yesterday at the conclusion of the First Summit Forum on the China Animation Industry's Development and Youth's Healthy Growing Up.

Black Cat Detective

The ten cartoons include Century Sonny, Tortoise Hanba's Stories, Black Cat Detective, SkyEye, Lao Mountain Taoist, Nezha Conquers the Dragon King, Wanderings Of Sanmao, Zhang Ga the Soldier Boy, The Blue Mouse and the Big-Faced Cat and 3000 Whys of Blue Cat. They were voted on by nearly 300,000 netizens since the poll began on September 21. In total 178 China-produced cartoons were nominated.

The first summit forum was held in Qingdao, Shandong Province from November 4 to 5, sponsored by the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League of China, the Information Office of the State Council, the Ministry of Culture, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Public Security, Ministry of Science and Technology, Ministry of Information Industry, General Administration of Press and Publication, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, the State General Administration of Sport, Care-About-Next-Generation Committee and Qingdao municipal government and organized by China Youth Association For Network Development.

Several cartoonists from the United States, Japan, South Korea, France and China's Hong Kong and Taiwan regions, along with youth and cultural organizations and representatives from animation enterprises attended the event.

Lu Yongzheng, a member of the Secretariat of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, stressed at the opening ceremony on November 3 that people in the industry should present healthy animation productions to teenagers and asked people to create a healthy cyberspace for Chinese youth. A joint manifesto on the industry's development and youngsters growing up in a healthy way was released later. Shadow puppet plays and cartoon art exhibitions were also held during the two-day event.

Experts who participated in the summit explained that among cartoon readers 11 percent were under 13, 59 percent between 14 to 17 year-olds and 30 percent were over 18. They estimated there were 500 million people who could be identified as cartoon consumers. However, according to the research, among Chinese youngsters only 11 percent said their favorite cartoons were "home-made" (including those produced in Hong Kong and Taiwan), 60 percent were from Japan while 29 percent from the United States and Europe.

(China.org.cn by Zhang Rui November 6, 2006)