New quality productive forces are key for China to continue building a modern industrial system and attain sustainable development. The strategy, first mentioned by Chinese President Xi Jinping last September, is also crucial for achieving the objectives and tasks set out in the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025) in its final year of implementation.   With innovation playing the leading role, new quality productive forces mean advanced productivity that is freed from traditional growth constraints, features high technology, high efficiency and high…

Automated guided vehicles shuttle through the workshop and transport various parts to different production lines. The huge robotic arm completes each step incessantly and quietly. The humming sound of machines and noise of factory floor conversations associated with traditional manufacturing processes are largely absent.   That’s the scene at the Lingang Base of Shanghai-headquartered SAIC Motor Passenger Vehicle Co., one of China’s top automakers.   But SAIC is not alone. More and more factories in Shanghai are making use of advanced technologies…

The medical equipment valley in Jiading District of Shanghai, known as Shanghai MedValley, is a powerhouse of medical innovation. As an industrial park centred on creative medical equipment development, the valley has gathered a cluster of high-end medical device enterprises and highly qualified professionals. It aims to promote new quality productive forces in the medical field, with a focus on developing devices for advanced diagnosis and highly effective treatment. It is home to seven major research institutions and joint labs,…

China’s focus on nurturing new quality productive forces while promoting high-quality development provides foreign investors with enormous market opportunities and vast development prospects, amid rising uncertainties in the global economic landscape. In a series of recent engagements with China, foreign investors, including British businesses, have expressed confidence in the future prospects of the market.   At the China-UK Business Collaboration and Communication Conference held on 2 April in Beijing, attendees were of the view that the digital economy has become a…

An important feature of China developing its aerospace industry is its insistence on self-reliance and independent innovation, because China firmly believes that aerospace is a hi-tech industry and high core technologies cannot be bought. Only by mastering core technologies can China firmly grasp the initiative in development.  Talent and infrastructure are bottlenecks that have long restricted Africa’s development. To help to improve African countries’ independent capabilities in space, China attaches great importance to providing intellectual support for African scientific researchers…

High-level opening up and policies to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) were hot topics during the annual sessions of the National People’s Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee, China’s key annual political meetings commonly known as Two Sessions.  China has been one of the most popular FDI destinations over the years and has benefitted from it. However, last year, according to data from the State Administration of Foreign Exchange, China’s actual use of FDI…

Every winter, flocks of ruddy shelducks fly to Xiaotanzi, a village on the bank of the Yellow River in Jungar Banner in north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. Here they blithely play over and on the waters, providing a lovely view to people.  The past few years have witnessed the issuance of numerous measures aimed at protecting the Yellow River’s Jungar Banner section that runs 238 km, notably for controlling desertification and industrial wastewater, as well as the introduction of…

As the Chinese people across the country prepare to celebrate the upcoming Spring Festival holiday, Liu Zhongyuan, a technician at the Ruichen Wanniu Livestock Farm in Jungar Zhao Town, Jungar Banner, Inner Mongolia, is busy at work.   Unlike conventional cattle farms, Ruichen Wanniu Livestock Farm adopts a new agro-husbandry development model that integrates livestock breeding with photovoltaics, featuring solar power panels installed atop the cowsheds. The farm is part of a startling transformation this traditional mining area has gone through.…

As Africa pushes forward its industrialisation process, the Chinese-built industrial parks and free trade zones have assumed special significance as drivers of the region’s industrial development and job creation. At the same time, Africa is also learning from China’s successful experience in industrialisation.  What are the ways in which China and African countries can deepen industrial cooperation? What are the roadblocks to such cooperation and the process of industrialisation in Africa?   Officials, scholars and business representatives from China and Africa…

As a boy growing up in Durban, the largest seaport city in South Africa, Kashveer Raghunath is no stranger to port terminals. But when he walked into the Hairun Container Terminal located in berths 4-6 of the Haicang section of the Xiamen Port, what he saw was totally different from that in his hometown.  On 14 November, Raghunath visited the Xiamen Port to experience the smart production, modern facilities and international services of the terminal, along with 16 other young…