What Can we Expect at the Next Stage of Economic Development?

High-quality development will be the focus during China’s 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25) period, according to proposals of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee for the formulation of the plan and the long-range objectives through 2035. This priority is based on assessment of the stage, environment and conditions for the country’s development. Accordingly, the Fifth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee in October made the transformation of the growth model the primary task in that period to produce better quality, higher efficiency and more robust drivers.

The background

Since the 18th CPC National Congress in 2012, China has entered a new normal in economic development with a vision of innovative, coordinated, green and open development that is for everyone. The 19th CPC National Congress in 2017 underlined that the economy is transitioning from a phase of rapid growth to a stage of high-quality development.

It’s both necessary and urgent to adopt the new strategy, which is essential for sustained and healthy economic development. The principal contradiction facing Chinese society is that between unbalanced and inadequate development and the people’s ever-growing needs for a better life. After becoming a moderately prosperous society in all respects, China will build itself into a modern socialist country in an all-round way. In the new stage, demand, supply and the potential growth rate are undergoing profound changes. So if high-speed growth is pursued still regardless of the actual situation, there would be risks.

The rules of economic development show that when a country enters the middle and later periods of industrialization, modernization can be completed only by shifting from scale- and speed-oriented growth to one that is quality- and efficiency-focused.

With the novel coronavirus disease wreaking havoc, China, to forestall and defuse various kinds of risks and address challenges, needs to focus more on improving the quality of its development. This requires commitment to the new development philosophy, deepening supply-side structural reform and transforming the growth model to deliver real benefits to the people.

Review of results

The focus of economic development accelerated shift in the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20) period. With new progress in urbanization, regional integration and institutional improvement, the Chinese economy has achieved better quality, efficiency, fairness, sustainability and security.

Economic growth has stayed within a reasonable range. The GDP increased over 6.5 percent annually on average in 2016-19 and reached close to 100 trillion yuan ($15.2 trillion) in 2019, with the per-capita GDP exceeding $10,000. Agricultural production has remained stable while industrial performance and services have registered fast growth as productivity improved. The fundamental role of consumption and the function of investment have been brought into effective play.

Quality and effectiveness continue to improve. The domestic market and demand have boosted the economy with consumption’s contribution to the GDP growth surpassing 60 percent in 2016-19. Substantial results have been achieved in supply-side structural reform and the industrial structure has been upgraded with hi-tech and equipment manufacturing expanding rapidly. New products and business models such as the shared economy, platform economy and digital economy are on the rise.

The agricultural supply structure has been optimized and there is an accelerated integration among primary, secondary and tertiary industries in rural areas.

In 2019, the service industry, driven more by innovation and improved labor productivity, contributed 59.4 percent to the economic rise. That year, an average of 20,000 new enterprises were established every day.

The commercialization of 5G, technological breakthroughs in information, biology and aerospace and thriving artificial intelligence and big data have all added vigor to China’s economy, resulting in it climbing up to the 14th place in the Global Innovation Index, the annual ranking of countries compiled by the New York-based Cornell University, business school INSEAD and the World Intellectual Property Organization.

The environment has also improved with major outcomes in combating pollution. China’s forest coverage is now 22.96 percent. About one quarter of the newly added green area was created between 2000 and 2017, ranking first in the world.

The quality of life has improved significantly. The past years have seen 55.75 million people in rural areas get rid of poverty. China vowed to eradicate absolute poverty by the end of 2020 and by November, all 832 registered poor counties shook off poverty.

Public services have benefited everyone and the world’s largest social security system has been established. New urban jobs reached 53.78 million in 2016-19. In 2019, the national per-capita disposable income hit 30,733 yuan ($4,673), making China the country with the largest middle-income population of 400 million.

Future outlook

As China is poised to enter a new stage with the 14th Five-Year Plan, it is essential to implement new ideas for a new development landscape. The vision is to build a country strong in science and technology with innovation at the core of the modernization.

Self-sufficiency in sci-tech should be a national strategy, with companies thinking out of the box. New ideas should be the primary force to upgrade industrial structures, rebuild advantages for economic advancement, and create new demand and new employment. They should also be harnessed to increase income, cope with resource limitations and realize green development.

It’s also crucial to promote a modern industrial system.

The standard of the industrial and supply chains should be improved, and strategic emerging industries nurtured. A modern service industry should be developed, with infrastructure construction elevated, and transportation, energy and digitalization consolidated to raise competitiveness.

Priority should be given to agriculture and rural areas. Issues relating to agriculture, rural areas and rural people are associated with livelihood as China has a large population and agriculture plays a fundamental role in the economy. Rural vitalization with Chinese characteristics, where the profits of industrial production are utilized to support agriculture and the experience of cities is applied in villages, should be followed. The coordinated development of urban and rural areas will form a new type of relationship between the two and hasten common prosperity.

The development of regions should be coordinated with the new urbanization. The structure of territorial space should be optimized to buoy up new urbanization under the goal of building a modern urban-rural system that highlights both their advantages and dynamic coordination.

In the next five years, the Beautiful China initiative should receive more importance. Perseverance is needed to explore a new path for environment-friendly growth, build a long-term mechanism and promote green transformation.

It is essential to deepen reform and facilitate high-level opening up. Major reforms in state-owned enterprises and sci-tech, education, fiscal, taxation and income distribution systems should be implemented. A complete set of indicators, policies, standards and performance evaluation measures is needed to facilitate high-quality development.

To meet people’s growing needs for a better life, policies to boost income and employment will play a significant role. Efforts should also be ramped up to implement the Healthy China initiative, respond to the aging population, and innovate ways of social governance to magnify people’s sense of gain, happiness and security.

China should also expand cooperation with other participants of the Belt and Road Initiative, take an active part in the reform of global economic governance and work for international cooperation and win-win results.

The author is president of the Academy of Macroeconomic Research of the National Development and Reform Commission.