Worldwide Outlook
The Belt and Road Initiative fuels globalization and sustainable development
TThe author is professor of economics and director of the Belt and Road Research Institute at the Beijing Normal University he Belt and Road Initiative, proposed by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013, aims to help people around the world enjoy a better life. With this new platform, China is ready to conduct closer cooperation with other countries and contribute more to solving major global issues.
Positive influence
Committed to building a community with a shared future for humanity, China has always been a staunch supporter of globalization. It has opened its market wider to the outside world and strengthened cooperation with other countries in trade, investment, finance, science, education and people-to-people exchanges.
Belt and Road practices in the past six years show that the initiative can directly drive globalization. Under the current situation, it is important to promote the continuous development of the trend, and in particular, its transformation and upgrading.
The initiative provides a completely open and inclusive platform. Whether a country is rich or poor, big or small, located in Africa, Asia, Latin America or Europe, it can participate in the initiative, which is not about regionalism or geopolitics. Each country can, through cooperation on an equal, voluntary and mutually beneficial basis, promote common development. This is consistent with the spirit of globalization to break isolation and advance global integration.
Since the core of the initiative lies in achieving better connectivity in areas such as transport and communication, goods and services, and capital and personnel, it is conductive to the free flow of various elements on a global scale and the expansion of international trade, investment and tourism. This faster growth will positively influence the progress of globalization.
The initiative also focuses on strengthening infrastructure by providing adequate financing. Since many developing countries badly need financing for infrastructure, Belt and Road construction is beneficial to them, especially poorer ones. By pushing forward the initiative, balanced development of all countries is likely to be achieved. In this way, a new type of globalization that benefits more people will gradually emerge.
Complementary role
There are other intractable global problems waiting to be solved, such as the current global governance system itself, which needs to be improved and reformed.
More countries should play a role in global governance according to the changing world situation. At the same time, major countries that have yet to play a full role should take on more responsibilities. In this way, we can gradually achieve the goal that the world should be governed by all.
Given difficulties in reforming the current system, specific public goods and services can be provided to fill the gaps.
Reform of the current system is needed, while new and complementary solutions are of equal importance.
Providing adequate financing for infrastructure to less developed countries should be the focus of international institutions such as the World Bank, but due to various reasons, they are incapable of doing so. The gap between supply and demand remains huge and cannot be solved in the short term.
Against this backdrop, China and other countries can finance infrastructure construction through innovative means, promote economic development, and provide new employment opportunities for lowincome populations under the Belt and Road Initiative.