Forging ahead on a new journey
OCTOBER 1 marks the 73rd anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China. I would like to extend my warm congratulations to all Chinese communities, enterprises and students in Jamaica and express my sincere gratitude and best wishes to friends of all circles in Jamaica who care for and support the development of China-jamaica relations!
Over the past 73 years, under the strong leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the tireless efforts of the Chinese people, China has witnessed profound changes across its land and achieved remarkable achievements. The Chinese nation has achieved the tremendous transformation from standing up and growing rich to becoming strong. In particular, since socialism with Chinese characteristics entered a new era in 2012, under the strong leadership of the Central Committee of the CPC with Comrade Xi Jinping as its core, China has realised the first centenary goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects and is now marching in confident strides toward the second centenary goal of building China into a great modern socialist country in all respects. China’s national rejuvenation has become a historical inevitability.
China’s economy has enjoyed high-quality development in the past decade. China commits to promoting highquality development and continuously innovates and improves its macro-control efforts, which led to both rational increase in the volume and steady improvement in quality of its economy. China’s GDP reached 114.4 trillion yuan (about US$17.7 trillion) in 2021, expanding at an average annual growth rate of 6.6 per cent in a decade, higher than the growth pace of 2.6 per cent for the global economy and 3.7 per cent for developing economies. China’s average contribution to global economic growth exceeded 30 per cent, ranking first in the world. China’s economic aggregate accounted for over 18 per cent of the world’s total in 2021, up from 11.3 per cent in 2012, ranking the second largest in the world. China’s GDP per capita exceeded US$12,000 in 2021, up from US$6300 in 2012.
The living standards of the Chinese have improved steadily in the past decade. China sticks to the people-centred development philosophy and ensures that people enjoy a happy life as the starting point and ultimate goal of all its work, so as to make more development achievements benefit all in a more inclusive manner. China has lifted all 98.99 million rural residents living below the current poverty line out of poverty and has historically eliminated absolute poverty, making great contributions to the global cause of eradicating poverty. China’s total employment maintained over 740 million and over 13 million new urban jobs were created annually in the past decade. The average life expectancy of the Chinese people has increased to 78.2 years. Chinese people have an increasingly stronger sense of fulfillment, happiness and security.
INNOVATIVE DEVELOPMENT
China’s innovative development capacity has been enhanced constantly in the past decade. China sticks to innovative development, enables innovation as the primary driving force behind development, and commits to making itself a country of innovators and a science and technology giant. China’s total research and development (R&D) expenditure increased from 1.03 trillion yuan in 2012 to 2.79 trillion yuan in 2021, accounting for 2.44 per cent of its GDP, up from 1.91 per cent, and ranking second in the world. China ranked 12th in the Global Innovation Index 2021, up 22 places from 10 years ago. Nearly two million 5G base stations have been rolled out in China. Its innovation capacity has constantly been enhanced to new heights with many examples, including the Fendouzhe (Striver) deepsea manned submersible diving to a depth of over 10,000 metres; the C919 large passenger aircraft being granted airworthiness certificates and delivered; the Chang’e lunar probes; the Zhurong Mars rover; the Xihe solar exploration satellite; the construction of the Beidou Navigation Satellite System global network, and the completion of the construction of China’s Space Station within this year.
China’s advancement of ecological civilisation has yielded remarkable achievements in the past decade. China sticks to green development and strives to build a beautiful China where people live in harmony with nature in order to make greater contributions to jointly building a clean and beautiful world. In the past decade, China’s carbon emissions intensity per GDP has been reduced by 34.4 per cent, and the share of coal use in its primary energy mix has been declined from 68.5 per cent to 56 per cent. China’s installed renewable energy capacity has topped one billion kilowatts, expanding 210 per cent and remaining top globally. China’s accumulative afforestation area amounted to about 59.44 million hectares and its forest coverage rate has been increased to 24.02 per cent in the past decade. China has phased out over 30 million obsolete and heavy-emissions vehicles. China’s new energy vehicles (NEVS) sales reached 3.52 million units, ranking first worldwide.
China’s level of opening up has been expanded in the past decade. China upholds the conception of openness, cooperation, solidarity and win-win results, firmly expands its opening-up on all fronts, and strives to build an open world economy. In 2020, the total value of China’s goods and services trade reached US$5.3 trillion, surpassing the US to be the first in the world. In 2021, this number increased to US$6.9 trillion, remaining the first globally. In the first eight months of 2022, China’s foreign trade of goods jumped 10.1 per cent year on year to 27.3 trillion yuan (about US$3.95 trillion), and the foreign direct investment (FDI) into the Chinese mainland, in actual use, expanded 16.4 per cent year on year to 892.74 billion yuan (about US$138.41 billion, up 20.2 per cent), which reveals the confidence of the international community in China’s future economic development.
The 20th National Congress of the CPC will be convened in the middle of this month. It will be an important meeting to be held at a critical time as China embarks on a new journey toward its second centenary goal of building a modern socialist country in all respects. At this national congress, the CPC will fully review the major achievements made and valuable experience gained in China’s reform and development endeavours. It will also formulate programmes of action and overarching policies to meet China’s new development goals on the journey ahead in the new era and the new expectations of the people. China will continue to follow the Chinese path to modernisation to achieve the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, and will continue to promote the building of a community with a shared future for mankind. By doing so, we will create new opportunities for the world with new advances in China’s development and contribute its vision and strength to world peace and development and human progress.
This year marks the 60th anniversary of the indepnce of Jamaica, which provides a great opportunity for Jamaica to gather national strength and plan for its future development. This year also marks the 50th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Jamaica. Over the past 50 years, under the strategic guidance of the leaders of our two countries, China-jamaica relations maintain steady and sound development. The bilateral practical cooperation has continuously been enhanced, and the people-to-people exchanges between two countries have broadly been carried out, bringing many tangible benefits to our two countries and two peoples. Over the past 50 years, China’s accumulative investment in Jamaica has exceeded US$2.1 billion, creating more than 35,000 direct jobs for Jamaica. China highly appreciates Jamaica’s adherence to the one-china principle, and stands ready to work with Jamaica to firmly defend the Un-centred international system and the international order underpinned by international law, firmly support multilateralism and the global cause of justice, and resolutely safeguard the common interests of developing countries.
Look into the future at a time when 60th anniversary of the independence of Jamaica meets with the 50th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Jamaica, I am fully confident in the bright future of the development momentum of both China and Jamaica, China-jamaica relations and bilateral practical cooperation. Let’s seize the historical opportunity, follow the historical trend, and work hand in hand with concerted efforts to jointly promote high-quality Belt and Road cooperation and implement the Global Development Initiative, so as to promote China-jamaica Strategic Partnership to a higher level, yield more achievements at a new historical starting point, and make greater contributions to building a community with a shared future for mankind!
I sincerely wish for China and Jamaica to be strong, prosperous and peaceful! I also wish that Chinese and Jamaican people and other peoples around our world enjoy happiness and wellness!