The 2024 Guangdong Country Singer Competition kicked off on June 26 at the Haixinsha Asian Games Park in Tianhe district of Guangzhou, the capital of South China's Guangdong province.

The nation's first competition to aim at boosting rural vitalization and Guangdong's "100 counties, 1,000 towns, and 10,000 villages" development projects, the competition was launched in 2023.

Last year's event attracted more than 11,000 registrations, over 660,000 spectators who watched over 30 qualifying rounds, and 175 million online views.

The Dayongning Band, winner of the 2023 competition, performs its song A Po De Kui Shan (Granny's Palm-leaf Fan) at the opening ceremony of this year's competition in Tianhe. [Photo/Guangzhou Daily]

Since the end of April, more than 12,000 people have signed up for this year's event, which will have eight divisions in the cities of Guangzhou, Shanwei, Meizhou, Qingyuan, Zhongshan, Yangjiang, Heyuan, and Zhaoqing.

The schedule is divided into six stages – including online registrations, city division competitions, online competitions, online voting, the semi-finals, and the finals. The total prize amounts to 200,000 yuan ($27,514).

A bazaar sells Guangdong's featured agricultural products, including lychees from Shantou's Leiling town and pineapples from Zhongshan's Shenwan town, at the opening ceremony of this year's competition. [Photo/Guangzhou Daily]