Some of the finest film-making talent from across Asia have been honored at the 26th Shanghai International Film Festival (SIFF) as the Asian New Talent awards ceremony took place in the east China metropolis on Thursday.

Five of the 11 nominated films were awarded after thorough and in-depth discussions by a six-member jury panel chaired by Chinese director Cao Baoping, who had himself earned a prize at the 2006 edition of the Asian New Talent awards for his solo directorial feature “Trouble Makers”.

This year’s award-winning features include Chinese drama “Friday, Funfair”, which scooped the best film, and the Indian production “In the Name of Fire”, which won best director and best actor, while the best actress award went to the star of “Bird of a Different Feather”, another hard-hitting film from India.

Two other Chinese films were recognized, with the best cinematography prize going to the suspenseful film “Habitat”, and the best screen-writing award going to “Fishbone”, a family-focussed drama.

Now into its 26th edition, the SIFF continues to focus on the discovery of new talent in film-making with the Asian New Talent competition playing a vital role.

This year marks the 20th edition of the new talents competition following its launch in 2004 to create a dedicated platform for showcasing directorial debuts and nurturing up-and-coming film-making talent from Asia.

“The competition promotes exchanges between new directors from China and other countries. I think they can draw inspirations from each other. This explains the significance of the Asian New Talent awards. Other domestic film festivals may not be able to achieve that,” said Cao.

Founded in 1993, the SIFF is seen as a prestigious global event for the film industry. This year’s edition is scheduled to run from June 14 to 23.

Shanghai Int’l Film Festival champions rising stars of Asian film-making

China has allocated multiple batches of funds to provinces and regions across the country to support disaster relief efforts, including flood and drought response.

The Organization Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee has allocated a special fund of 138 million yuan (about 19.01 million U.S. dollars) to 11 provinces and regions to help with flood and drought relief work.

The fund comes from Party fees collected from CPC members and administered by the department on behalf of the CPC Central Committee.

The department said that all local authorities need to make every effort to deal with the disaster, do a solid job in flood control, rescue and relief work, minimize disaster losses, and effectively ensure the safety of people’s lives and property and overall social stability.

According to the department, officials at all levels should pay close attention to flood control and drought relief and implement various relief measures carefully.

The department also stressed that the fund should be promptly allocated to the people at the primary level, mainly for Party members, officials, and residents who are fighting on the front lines of flood control and drought relief and those who have encountered difficulties due to serious disasters.

The fund will also cover repairing damaged education facilities at the primary level for Party members.

The department said the authorities of relevant provinces and regions should allocate supporting funds in a timely manner in accordance with the actual situation to control floods and ease the drought.

Moreover, the Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Water Resources said on Wednesday that it had already allocated 916 million yuan (about 126.16 million U.S. dollars) to flood and drought response work in the country’s southern and northern regions and to support disaster relief efforts.

The Ministry of Finance said on Friday that 105 million yuan (about 14.46 million U.S. dollars) has also been allocated to support the urgent restoration of flood-damaged roads.

According to the ministry, the funds will be used promptly to restore roads destroyed by flooding in Guangdong, Guangxi, Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangxi, Hunan, and Guizhou and ensure safe traffic during the flood season.

Persistent rainfall has battered many of China’s southern regions this summer, damaging roads and buildings and leading to casualties.

The State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters on Friday activated a Level-IV emergency response to flooding in Jiangsu and maintained a Level-IV response in Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Guangdong, Chongqing, and Guizhou. It also downgraded the response in Guangxi from Level III to Level IV.

China allocates funds to help flood, drought relief efforts