By He Yin, Travel and consumption during the recent National Day holiday in China became a focus of foreign media outlets, which highlighted the record-breaking passenger volume of the railway system on the first day of the holiday, the surge in outbound tourism, and the bustling crowds at popular destinations. These observations exactly underscored a vibrant and thriving China.
Over the past 75 years since the founding of the People’s Republic of China, China has achieved a historic leap in economic development, comprehensive national strength, and international influence.
Statistics show that from 1979 to 2023, China’s gross domestic product has grown at an average annual rate of 8.9 percent, far exceeding the global average of 3 percent during the same period. Besides, the country’s average annual contribution to global economic growth stood at 24.8 percent.
Chinese President Xi Jinping said, “We will continue to advance high-quality development and Chinese modernization, enable the Chinese people to live a better life, and contribute more to sustainable development in the world. We have the confidence and determination that China’s development has a bright future.”
China’s vitality in development stems from the continuous efforts to deepen reforms. The country has continuously deepened reforms with great courage and determination over the past few decades, injecting a steady stream of vitality and momentum into its development.
The third plenary session of the 11th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) ushered in a new period: one of reform, opening up, and socialist modernization. The third plenary session of the 18th CPC Central Committee marked the start of a new journey of comprehensively deepening reform in the new era with systematic and holistic plans. The third plenary session of the 20th CPC Central Committee initiated a new era and new journey, further deepening reforms and continuously exploring the broad prospects of Chinese modernization.
China takes deepening reform across the board as the fundamental driving force for Chinese modernization. It is determined to get rid of all thinking and ideas and all institutional ailment that impede Chinese modernization. This way, the country is able to better adapt the relations of production to the productive forces, the superstructure to the economic base, and national governance to social development so as to provide strong impetus and institutional support for Chinese modernization.
China’s vitality in development stems from the efforts to continuously expand opening up. Opening up is a defining feature of Chinese modernization. Since the initiation of reform and opening-up, China has embraced a path of achieving common development through opening up.
China remains committed to the fundamental national policy of opening up to the outside world and pursues a mutually beneficial strategy of opening up. China’s development is both domestic and external oriented; while developing itself, China also shares more of its development outcomes with other countries and peoples.
China is pursuing high-standard opening up not just because it has achieved remarkable reform and development success through opening up, but also because this is the right way forward as shown by the laws of economy and the trend of the times.
The third plenary session of the 20th CPC Central Committee stressed that China must remain committed to the basic state policy of opening to the outside world and continue to promote reform through opening up. Leveraging the strengths of China’s enormous market, the country will enhance its capacity for opening up while expanding international cooperation and develop new institutions for a higher-standard open economy.
In the future, China will steadily expand institutional opening up, deepen foreign trade structural reform, and further reform the management systems for inward and outward investment. Additionally, China will also optimize the layout for regional opening up, and improve the mechanisms for high-quality cooperation under the Belt and Road Initiative.
International observers believe that China’s commitment to expanding high-level opening up will not only pave the way for Chinese modernization, but also continuously provide new opportunities for the world through the country’s high-quality economic development.
The reform and opening up policy has led to a miraculous transformation in China’s development. Looking ahead, as China further deepens reform and expands opening up comprehensively, it will continue to inject strong momentum into promoting high-quality development and advancing Chinese modernization.
