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China’s economically stagnant northeast’s partnership with more developed regions will aid its revival

The three northeastern provinces have much to learn from the economically developed provinces, which have accumulated rich experience over the past three decades of reform and opening up and have better understanding of development, effects of policy incentives and market rules.

China’s northeastern region is set for a make-over. Long seen as taking a back seat in the country’s economic growth wave over the past three decades, the State Council, China’s cabinet, has unveiled a new plan to change this status quo.

The region’s three economically challenged provinces of Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang are in line to establish one-on-one partnerships with three economically developed provinces in east and south China, as well as between four northeastern cities and four economically flourishing cities.

According to the plan, released in March, provincial partnerships will be set up between Liaoning and Jiangsu, Jilin and Zhejiang, and Heilongjiang and Guangdong; while pair-up cooperation will be created between the cities of Shenyang (Liaoning) and Beijing, Dalian (Liaoning) and Shanghai, Changchun (Jilin) and Tianjin, and Harbin (Heilongjiang) and Shenzhen in Guangdong. The work plan comprises 18 specific tasks in the four areas of institutional innovation, industrial restructuring, boosting entrepreneurship and building cooperation platforms.

As part of a broader strategy to revitalize the northeast, this new plan is a policy innovation, as it aims to coordinate development and create benefits for both the northeast and its more developed partners, instead of simply providing one-way assistance or poverty alleviation. Under the plan, exchanges and regular training of officials will play a significant role in emancipating northeastern residents’ mindsets to embrace market economy concepts. and huge room for development. The eastern and southern provinces and cities, meanwhile, have a more mature market economy system, in addition to abundant capital and buoyant private enterprises.

According to the new work plan, the concrete measures include the temporary assignment of provincial officials with rich experience and knowledge of market economy principles from the east and south of the country to the northeast and regular training sessions for civil servants and employees of enterprises. Such steps are vital for transforming planned economy thinking into a market economy mindset so that the northeast can become more competitive and innovative.

China has implemented three rounds of revitalization of the northeast since 2004. According to Fu Cheng, Chief of the Institute of Sociology at the Jilin Academy of Social Sciences, in the first two rounds, the Central Government made preferential policies for the region and expected that would take care of the problem. Now the revival plan has been upgraded by giving the region the opportunity to have positive interactions with more developed eastern and southern regions, Fu said.

“The three northeastern provinces have much to learn from the economically developed provinces, which have accumulated rich experience over the past three decades of reform and opening up and have better understanding of development, effects of policy incentives and market rules,” Fu told Chinafrica.

Fu said benefits also go the other way. “The