Building a new development pattern is an original achievement of great theoretical and practical significance in the supreme leader’s economic thought. In April, 2020, General Secretary of the Supreme Leader proposed at the meeting of the Central Financial and Economic Committee to build a new development pattern with the domestic big cycle as the main body and the domestic and international double cycles promoting each other. The Fifth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee systematically expounded the construction of a new development pattern, and the 20th CPC National Congress made important strategic arrangements to accelerate the construction of a new development pattern and focus on promoting high-quality development. Recently, during the second collective study in the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, General Secretary of the Supreme Leader made a profound exposition and put forward clear requirements on speeding up the construction of a new development pattern and enhancing the security initiative of development, which provided a powerful ideological motivation and scientific action guide for opening up a new look with confidence on the new journey.
Building a new development pattern is related to the overall situation and has far-reaching influence.
Building a new development pattern is a strategic decision based on achieving the goal of the second century, overall development and security, and a strategic deployment to grasp the initiative of future development, which is of great and far-reaching significance for building a socialist modernization power in an all-round way and promoting the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation with Chinese modernization.
First, focusing on coordinating the "two overall situations" is related to achieving the goal of the second century as scheduled. At present, we are closer, more confident and capable of achieving the goal of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation than at any time in history. At the same time, the world’s unprecedented changes in a hundred years have accelerated its evolution, and the global economic map and governance pattern are facing reshaping. We are now in a time when it is more urgent to wander in the middle of a boat and steeper when people reach the middle of a mountain road. It is a time when it is more difficult and more dangerous to advance, but if you don’t advance, you will retreat and have to enter. It is a strategic choice to realize China’s economic modernization to put the development foothold at home, smooth the domestic big cycle and promote the mutual promotion of domestic and international double cycles. Only by speeding up the construction of a new development pattern, stabilizing the basic economic disk, and promoting the effective improvement of quality and reasonable growth of quantity can we continuously enhance the viability, competitiveness, development and sustainability of China’s economy and successfully achieve the goal of building a socialist modern power in an all-round way.
Second, focusing on expanding domestic demand as a whole and deepening supply-side structural reform is related to consolidating the foundation of China’s economic development. China has a super-large domestic market, the most complete industrial system, perfect supporting capacity and rich human resources. Building a new development pattern is conducive to cultivating a complete domestic demand system, improving the adaptability and flexibility of the supply structure, making the supply system better adapt to the changes in the demand structure, and achieving a leap to a high level of supply and demand balance. Only by accelerating the construction of a new development pattern, organically combining the implementation of the strategy of expanding domestic demand with deepening the structural reform on the supply side, forming a higher level dynamic balance of demand pulling supply and supply creating demand, and realizing a virtuous circle of the national economy, can we continuously improve the quality of economic development, consolidate the foundation of economic development, cross the important barrier of economic development in big countries, and continuously enhance China’s economic strength, scientific and technological strength and comprehensive national strength.
Third, focusing on overall development and security is related to enhancing the security and stability of development. At present, the epidemic situation in the century has a far-reaching impact, the anti-globalization trend is on the rise, unilateralism and protectionism are obviously rising, the recovery of the world economy is weak, local conflicts and turmoil are frequent, global geopolitical and security risks are increasing, and the uncertainty and instability of China’s development external environment are obviously rising. Strengthening the security and stability of development has become a top priority. Only by speeding up the construction of a new development pattern, breaking through the blocking point of the national economic cycle, coping with the instability of the international cycle with the reliability of the domestic big cycle, realizing the self-reliance of high-level science and technology, and improving the quality and level of the domestic and international double cycle, can we firmly hold the bottom line of safe development and ensure the stability and far-reaching development of China’s economic giant.
Fourth, focusing on coordinating international cooperation and competition is related to firmly grasping the initiative in future development. At present, the pattern of international economic cycle is accelerating reconstruction, the global division of labor system is deeply adjusted, and the competition is becoming increasingly fierce. Accelerating the construction of a new development pattern is an active choice to reshape China’s new advantages in international cooperation and competition based on the characteristics of super-large-scale economies. Only by speeding up the construction of a new development pattern, participating in the international division of labor more effectively, actively participating in shaping the supply chain value chain of the international industrial chain, and improving the global resource allocation ability in the cooperative competition, can we reach a broad consensus, carry out in-depth cooperation, cultivate and enhance China’s new advantages in international cooperation and competition, and win the strategic initiative in the open development.
Building a new development pattern, making solid progress and achieving results
Under the scientific guidance of the supreme leader’s economic thought, we have taken the initiative to build a new development pattern, the ideological consensus has been continuously condensed, the ability level has been continuously improved, the work foundation has been continuously consolidated, the policy system has been continuously improved, the leading role of the domestic grand cycle has been further strengthened, and the benign interaction and mutual promotion between the domestic and international double cycles have accelerated, effectively supporting the stable, healthy and sustainable development of China’s economy and laying a solid foundation for achieving high-quality development.
First, consumer demand continues to be released. In recent years, by improving consumption capacity, improving consumption conditions and creating consumption scenarios, China’s consumption potential has been released rapidly, and the traction and driving effect of consumption on the economic cycle has continued to emerge. China has become the second largest consumer market in the world, and the total retail sales of social consumer goods will reach 44 trillion yuan in 2022. The consumption structure has been accelerated and upgraded, and mass consumption such as automobiles is in the ascendant. Service consumption is accelerating expansion and upgrading, and new consumer demand such as online consumption and green consumption is effectively stimulated. During the Spring Festival of 2023, the sales revenue of consumer-related industries in China increased by 12.2% year-on-year, the domestic tourism revenue increased by 30% year-on-year, and the movie box office exceeded 6.7 billion yuan, ranking second in the box office of China Film History during the Spring Festival. While consumer demand continues to be released, China’s consumer prices have maintained a stable trend. In the past 10 years, the increase in consumer prices has stabilized at a low level of around 2%, creating good conditions for expanding consumption.
Second, effective investment continues to expand. Focusing on high-quality development and comprehensively improving quality and efficiency, China’s total investment has continued to grow steadily and the investment structure has continued to be optimized. In 2022, when the investment in real estate development decreased by 10% year-on-year, China’s fixed assets investment increased by 5.1% year-on-year, exceeding 57 trillion yuan, of which the investment in manufacturing industry increased by 9.1% year-on-year and the investment in high-tech manufacturing industry increased by 22.2% year-on-year, achieving a double improvement in investment scale and quality. Investment in infrastructure construction has been promoted in an orderly manner, major projects such as Wudongde and Baihetan Hydropower Station have been put into operation, and major projects such as sichuan-tibet railway and "Counting East and Calculating West" have been fully implemented, which has played a leading role in the economic cycle. Driven by the reform of investment and financing system, the investment environment has been continuously optimized and investment confidence has been further enhanced.
Third, science and technology have taken solid steps towards self-reliance. China’s scientific and technological strength is moving from quantitative accumulation to qualitative leap, from point breakthrough to system capability improvement. The overall strength of science and technology has been significantly enhanced, and the ranking of global innovation index has been continuously improved, ranking 11th in the world in 2022. The investment in science and technology has greatly increased. The total social R&D expenditure has exceeded 3 trillion yuan, ranking second in the world, and the R&D intensity has increased to 2.55%, which is close to the national average of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The strategy of rejuvenating the country through science and education and strengthening the country through talents has been solidly promoted, and the total number of R&D personnel ranks first in the world. The innovation platform system has been continuously improved, the construction of the State Key Laboratory has been accelerated, and Beijing, Shanghai and Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area rank among the top 10 global science and technology clusters. The reform of the science and technology system has been deepened, and the innovation system and mechanism have been accelerated. Take the initiative to design and take the lead in launching international large-scale scientific plans and large-scale scientific projects, and establish a science and technology partnership plan. The "circle of friends" for scientific and technological innovation and open cooperation is growing.
Fourth, the modern industrial system is becoming more and more perfect. The pace of high-end development, digital empowerment and green transformation of China’s industries has accelerated, and the industrial basic capacity and industrial modernization level have improved rapidly. In 2022, the added value of high-tech manufacturing and equipment manufacturing increased by 7.4% and 5.6% respectively, which played a leading role in the transformation and upgrading of manufacturing industry. With the rapid development of digital economy, industrial digitalization and digital industrialization are accelerating. Industrial Internet has been applied to 45 categories of national economy, covering R&D, design, manufacturing and marketing services. The "green content" of industrial development has been significantly improved, and green industry has become a new kinetic energy for economic growth. The total installed capacity of renewable energy exceeds 1.2 billion kilowatts. The new energy automobile industry ushered in explosive growth, and its production and sales volume ranked first in the world for eight consecutive years.
Fifth, the pace of coordinated development between urban and rural areas has accelerated. Consolidate and expand the achievements of poverty alleviation and effectively link with rural revitalization, the two-way flow of urban and rural factors is smoother, and the income gap between urban and rural residents continues to narrow. The strategy of coordinated regional development, major regional strategies and the strategy of main functional areas have been solidly promoted, the carrying capacity of areas with economic development advantages such as central cities and urban agglomerations has been further enhanced, and the regional economic layout with complementary advantages and high-quality development has been accelerated. In 2022, the GDP of nine cities in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Yangtze River Delta and Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area Mainland reached 49.5 trillion yuan, exceeding 40% of the national total, which played an important role in the national economic ballast and high-quality development power source. The effect of comprehensive management of ecological environment in large rivers has been further manifested. The urbanization construction with the county as an important carrier has been carried out in a solid way, and a series of policy systems of "1+N+X" have taken shape.
Sixth, the construction of a unified national market was accelerated. The basic market system has been continuously improved, and the opinions of speeding up the construction of a unified national market have been issued. The negative list system for market access has been fully implemented and updated, and the reform of the commercial system has been continuously implemented. The institutional transaction costs of business entities have been continuously reduced, and the reform of "separation of licenses" has been fully covered, which has accelerated the cleaning up and abolition of various regulations and practices that hinder the unified national market and fair competition. The pace of market-oriented allocation of factors has been obviously accelerated, the reform of stock issuance and registration system has been fully implemented, the unified urban and rural construction land market has been accelerated, and the reform of household registration system has been continuously promoted. Significant progress has been made in the construction of modern circulation system, the national backbone circulation network has been gradually improved, and the ratio of total social logistics costs to GDP has been declining.
Seventh, the high level of opening up has achieved remarkable results. In the face of a more complicated and severe external environment, China’s foreign trade has shown great resilience and vitality, and the domestic and international double-cycle linkage effect has been continuously enhanced. The scale of trade has reached a new level. In 2022, China’s total trade in goods reached a record high, reaching 42.1 trillion yuan, maintaining its position as the world’s largest trade country in goods for six consecutive years; The total trade in services was about 6 trillion yuan, up 12.9% year-on-year. The trade structure continued to be optimized, the proportion of general trade increased steadily, the export of capital-intensive and technology-intensive products increased rapidly, and the export of high value-added services increased strongly. In the context of global cross-border investment downturn, China’s foreign investment has grown against the trend, and the actual use of foreign capital has increased from $144.37 billion in 2020 to $189.13 billion in 2022. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (RCEP) came into effect, the leading role of innovation demonstration in the Pilot Free Trade Zone has been continuously enhanced, and the construction of Hainan Free Trade Port has been accelerated. The international trains are connected to China Unicom in many directions, and the trains in China and Europe continue to grow. In 2022, 16,000 trains will be opened and 1.6 million TEUs will be sent, and the trains in the new land and sea channel in the west will grow rapidly. Especially during the epidemic, the China-Europe train, as an important stable channel to smooth the trade of goods between Asia and Europe, has become an important achievement and highlight of building the "Belt and Road".
Eighth, the ability of safe development has been significantly enhanced. Faced with the increase of uncertainties and unpredictable factors in the international development environment and the increasing fluctuation of global primary product supply, China insists on overall development and safety, pays special attention to primary product production based on itself, and responds to the uncertainty of external environment with the certainty of stable domestic supply. Firmly hold the red line of 1.8 billion mu of cultivated land, and the grain output has reached more than 1.3 trillion Jin for eight consecutive years. The domestic energy production support capacity has been continuously enhanced, and a diversified clean power supply system has been vigorously developed. In 2022, the production of major energy products such as kerosene, gas and electricity in industrial enterprises above designated size has maintained growth, and the dependence on foreign countries for oil and gas has declined. We will make overall plans to make up short boards and forge long boards, implement industrial base reconstruction projects and strengthen manufacturing chains to make up chains, and the resilience and competitiveness of the supply chain of the industrial chain will continue to improve. After the outbreak, relying on a complete industrial system, strong mobilization organization and industrial transformation ability, China quickly formed a strong production and supply capacity of epidemic prevention and control materials in a relatively short period of time, and the industrial chain supply chain showed strong resilience in the stress test of epidemic impact.
To build a new development pattern, we must deepen our understanding and highlight the key points
All great achievements are the result of continuous struggle, and all great undertakings need to be promoted in the future. Summing up experience and deepening understanding are important magic weapons for continuing struggle. In practice, we feel more deeply the great strategic significance of building a new development pattern for building a socialist modern power in an all-round way, and more deeply understand the great practical significance of building a new development pattern for coping with the great changes that have never happened in a century.
First, we must firmly grasp the key of smooth circulation. The key to building a new development pattern lies in the unimpeded economic cycle. If there are blocking points and breakpoints in the process of economic cycle, the cycle will be blocked, which will be manifested as the decline of growth rate, the increase of unemployment, the accumulation of risks, the imbalance of international payments, etc., and will be manifested as overcapacity, the decline of enterprise benefits, and the decline of residents’ income, etc. We must solve the blocking problems of production, distribution, exchange, consumption and other links in the domestic macro-cycle, strive to break the local small cycle, smooth the domestic macro-cycle, make overall plans to expand domestic demand and deepen the supply-side structural reform, improve the adaptability between supply and demand, and effectively enhance the endogenous motivation and stability of the domestic macro-cycle. At the same time, according to the change of comparative advantage, we should dynamically adjust the key areas and methods of China’s participation in international circulation, strive to improve the quality and level of international circulation, form an interactive relationship in which supply and demand match each other and domestic circulation and international circulation promote each other, and constantly promote a virtuous circle of the national economy that goes round and round and spirals.
Second, we must correctly grasp the dialectical relationship between internal and external circulation. It is necessary to realize that both internal and external circulation promote each other and cannot be neglected, whether it is coordinating development and security or participating in international competition and cooperation. In the process of building a new development pattern, we must take the domestic macro-cycle as the main body, constantly strengthen the leading role of the domestic macro-cycle, persist in putting the development of the country and the nation on the basis of our own strength, and enhance our ability and confidence to cope with various risk challenges with a solid domestic basic disk. At the same time, we must unswervingly implement the basic national policy of opening to the outside world and create a new open economic system at a higher level. To realize domestic and international double-cycle mutual promotion and common progress, it is necessary to give full play to the demand advantage of super-large-scale market and the supply advantage of complete industrial system, attract and gather high-end global resource elements, form a gravitational field for global resource elements, attract and utilize foreign capital more vigorously, and also go out steadily to strengthen overseas investment services, supervision and risk prevention and control.
Third, we must adhere to the problem-oriented and systematic concept. Adhering to the problem-oriented and systematic concept is an important methodology of the supreme leader’s economic thought. To build a new development pattern by adhering to the problem orientation, we should focus on major risk challenges, identify key links in key areas, work hard from unblocking blocking points, promoting advantages, filling shortcomings and strong and weak items, and strive to turn crises into opportunities and create conditions to improve the quality and level of economic cycles. Adhering to the concept of system to build a new development pattern, we must realize that the economic system is a complete and continuous whole in time and space, and it is a complex system that is interrelated and constantly moving. We should strengthen forward-looking thinking, overall planning, strategic layout and overall promotion, strengthen policy coordination and cooperation, drive the overall promotion with key breakthroughs, achieve key breakthroughs with overall promotion, and strive to achieve the combination of overall and local, gradual and breakthrough.
Fourth, we must guard against misunderstanding and action deviation. Building a new development pattern is a complex systematic project, and there are still some misunderstandings and action deviations in practice, which must be corrected in time. In understanding, we should not only avoid one-sided understanding that only emphasizes internal circulation or external circulation, but also avoid misunderstanding that the long-term task of building a new development pattern is regarded as a short-term emergency measure, and also avoid understanding self-reliance and self-improvement of science and technology as small and comprehensive repeated construction behind closed doors. In action, we should prevent ourselves from fighting each other, only consider the small market in this region and engage in our own small cycle, and also prevent selfish departmentalism. We think that building a new development pattern has little to do with our own departments, and we can’t form a joint effort if we only care about our own "one acre and three points".
Resolutely unify understanding and action with the decision-making and deployment of the CPC Central Committee.
Report to the 20th CPC National Congress of the Party pointed out that a new development pattern should be formed by 2035. We must profoundly understand and accurately grasp the decision-making arrangements of the CPC Central Committee, and with more firm ideological consciousness, hard work, precise and pragmatic policy measures, effectively incorporate the work in this field in this region into the construction of a new development pattern, make efforts to smooth the domestic economic cycle, promote the benign interaction between domestic and international double cycles, and effectively enhance the security and initiative of development.
First, accelerate the formation of a complete domestic demand system and form a higher level of dynamic balance. Adhere to the strategic starting point of expanding domestic demand, expand the domestic demand system according to the whole chain of production, distribution, circulation, consumption and investment reproduction, break through the difficulties that restrict the economic cycle, such as insufficient effective supply capacity, large income distribution gap, low modernization of circulation system, imperfect consumption system and mechanism, and investment structure still needs to be optimized, and strive to expand consumer demand with income support, investment demand with reasonable return, and financial demand with principal and debt constraints. Focus on tapping the potential of domestic demand, promoting consumption upgrading and expanding investment space. Efforts will be made to optimize the market structure, improve the market mechanism, stimulate market vitality, enhance market resilience, further enlarge and strengthen the domestic market, and continuously improve the attractiveness and allocation capacity of global resource elements.
The second is to speed up the pace of self-reliance and self-improvement in science and technology and shape the new advantages of domestic and international double circulation. Improve the new national system, strengthen the national strategic scientific and technological strength, promote the construction of international and regional scientific and technological innovation centers as a whole, and enhance the overall efficiency of the national innovation system. Deepen the reform of the scientific and technological system, strengthen the dominant position of enterprises in scientific and technological innovation, form a basic system to support innovation, optimize the allocation of innovative resources at home and abroad, strengthen basic research, implement a number of forward-looking and strategic national major scientific and technological projects in frontier fields such as artificial intelligence, quantum information and brain science, and speed up the conquest of "stuck-neck" technologies in important fields. We will promote the effective linkage between the strategy of rejuvenating the country through science and education, the strategy of strengthening the country through talents and the strategy of innovation-driven development, and promote the work of educational science and technology talents as a whole with the guidance of high-level science and technology self-reliance, so as to realize the deep integration of innovation chain’s industrial chain capital chain talent chain.
The third is to accelerate the construction of a modern industrial system and enhance the status of a global manufacturing center. Focus on the real economy, solidly promote new industrialization, and accelerate the construction of a manufacturing power, a quality power, a space power, a transportation power, a network power and a digital China. Actively promote short-board industries to supplement the chain, advantageous industries to extend the chain, traditional industries to upgrade the chain, and emerging industries to build the chain. Accelerate the development of high-end, intelligent and green manufacturing. We will promote the development of strategic emerging industries and foster a number of new growth engines such as information technology, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, new energy, new materials, high-end equipment and environmental protection. Build a high-quality and efficient new service industry system, promote the deep integration of modern service industry with advanced manufacturing industry and modern agriculture, and promote the deep integration of digital economy and real economy. Build a modern infrastructure system. Strengthen the security of grain, energy resources and important industrial chain supply chains.
Fourth, solidly promote the coordinated development of urban and rural areas and expand the vast and deep circulation space. Solidly promote the major strategic deployment of urban and rural areas, enhance the integrity and coordination of development, and provide multi-gradient growth, diversified development and strong and resilient urban and rural regional power support for building a new development pattern. We will further implement the rural revitalization strategy, accelerate the construction of an agricultural power, accelerate the pace of agricultural and rural modernization, further promote the new urbanization with people as the core, promote the integrated development of urban and rural areas, smooth the urban-rural economic cycle, and improve the coverage of the domestic macro-cycle. Establish and improve the cross-regional linkage development mechanism, improve the regional cooperation and interest adjustment mechanism, optimize the layout of major productive forces, focus on improving the power source function of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Yangtze River Delta and Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area to lead high-quality development, strengthen the support capacity of major agricultural products producing areas, key ecological functional areas, energy-rich areas and border areas, promote the deep integration and development of regional coordinated development strategies, major regional strategies and major functional areas strategies, and build a regional economic layout and land space system with complementary advantages and high-quality development.
Fifth, comprehensively deepen reform and opening up and enhance the dynamic vitality of internal and external circulation. Promote the market-oriented reform of land, labor, capital, technology, data and other factors, promote the independent and orderly flow of factors, and improve the efficiency of factor allocation. Open up the key blocking points that restrict the economic cycle and speed up the construction of a unified national market with high efficiency, standardization, fair competition and full opening. Strengthen the construction of business environment, improve the basic system of market economy such as property rights protection, market access, fair competition and social credit, and strengthen anti-monopoly and anti-unfair competition. We will steadily expand the institutional opening of rules, regulations, management and standards, innovate the development mechanism of service trade, accelerate the construction of Hainan Free Trade Port, and implement the strategy of upgrading the Pilot Free Trade Zone. Promote the high-quality development of the "Belt and Road" and expand new space for cooperation in the fields of health, green, digital and innovation. We will promote the stable scale and excellent structure of foreign trade and increase investment in key countries and manufacturing industries.
(Author Shi Yulong is the director of the Economic Thought Research Center of the Supreme Leader. Source: Economic Daily)
