Views: Chinese path to modernization

Editor's note: The Chinese path to modernization is in line with its national conditions and is the modernization of a huge population. And China's achievements have inspired many developing countries to seek their own path to development and prosperity. Three experts share their views on the issue with China Daily.

Overcoming demographic challenges

By Stuart Gietel-Basten

As everyone knows, China is aging rapidly. Not only that, China is expected to see a sharp decline in its total population size over the next century. Against this backdrop, for China's per capita GDP to continue to rise, productivity must grow more rapidly than the rate at which population is declining. Of course, China is not the first country that is going through the process of aging and a rapid slow-down in population growth. Many countries have gone through this transition and have been forced to transform their labor market systems in response. The predominant mode, of course, is the shift from an industrial to a service sector base. This transition is far from complete in China, and will inevitably develop further in the coming decades.

Rather than being only reliant on service industries, however, China should aim to climb further up the value chain of innovation. As a global leader in the development of technology, China still has tremendous potential to develop further in this field. While China's younger population has, indeed, declined in size, its characteristics have changed beyond all recognition in terms of skills and education. Harnessing both this skills revolution, as well as the entrepreneurial mindset of the younger generation, will be critical to China's efforts to develop its innovative industries. Obviously, the development of the Greater Bay Area and the synergies between the strengths of Guangdong province and Hong Kong could prove to be a key motor for such development.

However, developing goods and services which are responsive to the growing demands of the Chinese consumer could also drive stronger growth. Rather than criticizing younger people for their consumption habits, the economy should instead try to understand them, and better pivot towards meeting their needs and innovating in key growth areas such as time-saving and labor-saving products and services; pet products; healthcare and entertainment. Learning from the experience of other countries, developing unique cultural and leisure experiences could also be a means of revitalizing rural communities which are especially vulnerable to population decline and economic stagnation.

At the other end of the age-spectrum, there is tremendous potential in developing the so-called silver economy in response to not only an older population, but one which is relatively well resourced and looking for new consumption opportunities. Developing gerontechnology — or technological solutions to support older persons — could be a win-win scenario.

Currently, China lags far behind Japan as the world leader in innovation in this field. Leveraging its strengths in innovation and technology, and the burgeoning entrepreneurial mindset, could deliver rapid growth in this area. It would also offset some of the physical and financial obligations associated with rapid population aging. Developing telehealth and e-medicine platforms can also support the country's plans to ensure healthy aging.

More broadly, the plan to develop 10 industrial parks specifically dedicated to developing silver economy products and services should be welcomed. However, as a government official rightly observed, the underlying goal of developing the silver economy should not only be growth for its own sake, but also to create "equal, attainable services and products for seniors with particular difficulties".

However, in order to make the most of these opportunities, China must strive to ensure that the full potential of all its citizens is maximized. Further reform of the hukou (household registration) system will allow labors to move even more flexibly around the country and maximize the opportunities for all.

Clearly, the education system requires some reform: to not only ensure fairer access to the best education to all regardless of province of birth, but also to ensure it is better aligned with the needs of the contemporary labor market. More broadly, adapting work cultures and systems to accommodate the changing expectations of the younger generation is an urgent necessity. Moving away from the "cult of 996" (9 am to 9 pm, six days a week) to a healthier work-life balance will increase retention and productivity and reduce burnout and ill-health.

In order to ride out the oncoming demographic challenges, China will have to "do more with less". The good news, however, is that there is a lot of potential for the country to do just that.

The author is professor of humanities and social science at Khalifa University, Abu Dhabi, UAE.

20th Party Congress lessons for South Africa

By Paul Tembe

The year of 2023 is the first year after China convened its 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. The world's attention was focused on the congress on Oct 16-22, not least because China is the world's second-largest economy and the 20th CPC National Congress charted its future course of development.

The 20th Party Congress was held under strenuous geopolitical conditions — at a time when global inflation was touching new highs, the geopolitical balance was changing, and unilateralism and protectionism was increasing at the cost of multilateralism and peaceful shared development.

Despite all this, however, the 20th Party Congress declared China will adhere to the policy of further opening-up and pursuing win-win partnerships. In opting for cooperation instead of competition and confrontation, China aims to create an atmosphere that will help strengthen and support the United Nations and its mechanisms and work, in order to ensure countries reach a consensus on upholding regional and international bodies that promote harmony and prosperity.

The Chinese path to modernization, a key term defining China's journey toward national rejuvenation, has for the first time been written into the CPC National Congress report, with Xi Jinping, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, emphasizing the "central task" of the CPC is to serve the people and calling for efforts to realize national rejuvenation through the Chinese path to modernization.

Under the Party's leadership, China has made in a few decades the economic, technological and social achievements that the developed world took centuries to make.

Today, China is in a position to safeguard multilateralism and help resolve issues related to economic development, environmental protection, climate action and common prosperity that will promote world peace and facilitate the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.

In fact, the 20th Party Congress report is a document of reason in a world affected by rising protectionism and unilateralism. As China's road to modernization widens, its growth prospects will improve, prompting it to help the international community reap more benefits from China's development.

As for South Africa, as a comprehensive strategic partner of China, it can learn valuable lessons from China's successes. China's per capita disposable income has increased from 16,500 yuan ($2,370) in 2020 to 35,100 yuan in 2021. Over the past decade, China has focused on promoting high-quality development. As a result, its GDP increased from 54 trillion yuan to 114 trillion yuan.

China has been adhering to a people-centric philosophy of development, especially over the past decade. That China has been creating more than 11 million jobs each year is proof of the success of its people-centric development.

The 20th Party Congress also vowed to strengthen cooperation and deepen people-to-people relations with other countries. So South Africa can expect its trade with China to grow substantially. After all, China is South Africa's biggest trading partner, and South Africa is China's biggest trade partner among all African countries. Their annual trade value has reached $54 billion.

China is also expected to deepen reform and opening-up, which in turn is expected to also increase China's trade with Nigeria ($26 billion), Angola ($23 billion) and Egypt ($19 billion) and other African nations. As a matter of fact, South Africa and other African countries are set to benefit from an array of resolutions passed by the 20th Party Congress.

Lest we forget, all this has been possible because China's progress toward modernization has given rise to new mutually beneficial partnerships and strengthened the existing ones with developing countries, allowing them to expedite their economic development and realize modernization.

The rejuvenation of the Chinese nation through Chinese-style modernization will encourage South Africa and other African countries to seek solutions to their development problems from within their own value systems instead of relying on imported and non-productive development policies of the past.

The core message for South Africa and other African countries from the 20th Party Congress can therefore be: adopt long-term planning to improve governance, instead of taking short-term measures which many developed as well as developing countries have done; adopt a people-centric approach to development and modernization, instead of adhering to the notion of rights without obligations; China is committed to sharing the fruits of its economic development; and China's modernization will promote global peace and development.

One can expect China's modernization to also strengthen South-South cooperation.

The author is a sinologist and founder of SELE Encounters based in South Africa.

Responsible initiatives in contrast to West's exploitations

By Adnan Akfirat

The 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China held in October demonstrated the viability, legitimacy and sustainability of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the socialist market economy, which the Party has established to promote economic development and realize the country's modernization for the benefit of not only the Chinese people but also people in the rest of the world.

China's sense of responsibility is reflected in its initiatives such as the Belt and Road Initiative, Global Development Initiative, and Global Security Initiative. Take the Belt and Road Initiative for example, in the nearly past decade, trade in goods between China and Belt and Road partners reached about $12 trillion, and Chinese companies invested $43 billion in overseas economic and trade cooperation zones in partner countries and created 340,000 local jobs.

In stark contrast, after the end of the Cold War, the United States has been hellbent on subjugating the developing world. The resistance of many developed economies against globalization has become the new driving force of modernization in the Western sense of the term.

Washington gradually established the reign of the US dollar after the end of World War II, eliminating the currency exchange system based on real value measured in terms of gold reserves.

After establishing a dollar-centric global economy, Washington has been using the dollar's supremacy in the global economy and international trade to export domestic financial crises to other countries while harvesting global riches and ruining the financial stability of other countries.

Seigniorage is a principal way the United States gains monetary benefits. The cost of printing a $100 bill, for example, is less than 20 cents, while other countries have to pay $100 in goods or services in exchange for the $100 paper currency, and since half of the US currency circulates outside the country, earning substantial revenue for the US Treasury every year, one can imagine the sort of money the US earns from printing currency bills. Also, the US has been maintaining an external deficit year after year, importing more than it exports and consuming more than it produces.

The US' usury capital has established a tributary system, with the US military being the force of coercion. The US hegemony has turned into a "mafia-style dictatorship" which oppresses, exploits and alienates humankind.

Today, one of the priority targets is to change the mechanism to create wealth of the global usurers. The process to seek a fairer world order is taking place on the military, economic and political fronts.

Coming back to the crisis of Western countries, the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed it to the core, which is reflected in the collapse of entire systems, including healthcare and economic systems, in advanced economies. The rich Western countries hoarded more COVID-19 vaccines than they needed, instead of sharing them with developing and least-developed countries.

In stark contrast, President Xi Jinping's proposal to build a community with a shared future for mankind is an inclusive and mutually beneficial development concept.

In fact, the CPC with Xi Jinping at its core is in the best position to further develop scientific socialism, whose application in China has, in no small measure, provided more solutions to the problems facing humankind.

China's proposal to build a community with a shared future for mankind is in stark contrast to the selfish nature of US hegemony. And the crisis the US faces will make Washington face more challenges in keeping its hegemony.

The time has come to develop a global civilization that is people-centric, sharing and values-driven. In a world where production meets human needs, there is no scope for imperialism to dominate every aspect of human life.

The views don't necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

The author is chairman of the Turkish-Chinese Business Development and Friendship Association.

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