Natural Inspiration
Zhejiang explores a unique way to bridge the urban-rural gap
In the picturesque county of Suichang in Zhejiang Province, a century-old culture flourishes in the town of Suichang together with a drive to develop the digital economy with beautiful natural landscape. Today it boasts a digital green valley. Established companies as well as startups are operating from this space, exploring innovations that combine the ecology, culture and digitalization.
In the bright offices with floor-to-ceiling glass, different teams are busy working on different projects. Outside, one can see breathtaking mountains covered with lush greenery. When they are tired of programming, the employees can take a break for inspiration, going jogging up in the mountains or enjoying a cup of tea outside while admiring the scenery.
Digital transformation
The Digital Green Valley has more than 20 leading companies operating from the base, including Alibaba Cloud, Netease and the location service provider Qianxun, as well as over 600 new market entities. The contract value of the private investment here is nearly 8 billion yuan ($1.2 billion). The valley has also stimulated local industries. With the arrival of the new employees and construction workers, the earnings of local catering businesses jumped 1,000 percent in the first half of 2021, while the daily wages of temporary workers doubled from 100 yuan ($15.72) to 200 yuan ($31.44).
The Digital Green Valley represents the concept of a second space for innovation. With the major cities of China becoming innovation hubs with their characteristic industries, like Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou, now the drive is to create a second tier of such hubs in the smaller cities to spur the local economy and address the gap in development.
With the eradication of absolute poverty last year, China now faces the task of tackling disparities in different regions and between urban and rural development and incomes to achieve common prosperity. “Eradicating poverty, improving people’s livelihoods and achieving common prosperity are the essential requirements of socialism. It is an important manifestation of
our Party’s fundamental purpose to serve the people wholeheartedly. This is the government’s greatest responsibility,” President Xi Jinping said in February 2021.
In June 2021, the central government rolled out a guideline to build demonstration zones in Zhejiang Province for common prosperity as a trial measure. Despite its well-developed economy, Zhejiang still faces imbalance in development, especially in its over two dozen counties located in mountainous areas.
Subsequently, Zhejiang formulated an action plan for building demonstration zones during the period of 2021-25. Suichang is one of the counties to benefit from the demonstration zone policy. Official statistics show it registered the fastest growth among the 26 mountainous counties during the first half of 2021.
“It is difficult for Suichang, an underdeveloped mountainous county, to catch up with other well-developed regions in Zhejiang on traditional tracks. However, by changing to another development track, Suichang may find it easier,” said Zhang Zhuangxiong, Secretary of the CPC Suichang County Committee. Developing digital economy is the new track.
Suichang has found a specific direction, developing the digital economy based on its unique conditions.
Narrowing the urban-rural gap
Xiaofeng, a town in Huzhou City in north Zhejiang, has become a tourist destination. It has a rich historical legacy, and its ancient street retaining old architecture is a popular tourist destination.
“In the past, the ancient town was not developed systematically,” Pan Mingliang, Party chief of Xiaofeng, said. To address that, last year, the town set up a “resource bank” based on the popular saying of Xi that lucid waters and lush mountains are priceless assets. People “deposit” their natural resources in the bank and enjoy the profit generated by the resources that are used in an eco-friendly manner. A house, a mountain, a farming field or a lake - any natural or physical asset can be listed with the resource bank. They are then coordinated by a single authority, thereby pooling together fragmented ecological resources.
The bank listed the ancient street and its architectural landmarks in its database and funded the renovation of the street. Following the renovation, the value of property on the ancient street has tripled, according to estimates; and it has also boosted tourism, which generates more funds.
The many projects initiated by the resource bank include a hotel beside a reservoir, which is utilizing idle land in the village. The project is expected to create over 100 jobs. A village resort integrating catering, wellness services, recreation and shopping has been built in another village. It is expected to generate 120,000 yuan ($18,864) of annual income for the village.
To narrow the development gap between urban and rural areas, it is necessary to promote the flow of urban resources into rural areas and ecological products into cities. The resource bank is a channel for bringing in technologies, funds and talents to rural areas.
Huzhou is one of the first areas to pilot demonstration zones for common prosperity and narrow the rural-urban gap.
Wang Gang, Mayor of Huzhou, explained the goal in the following way, “Eliminating the difference means equalizing institutional services and supplies so that people enjoy the same sense of satisfaction, gain and safety no matter where they live. It is about equalizing development opportunities rather than the results and raising quality of life rather than recreating urban lifestyles in rural areas.”
A major gap that needed to be bridged was in public resources, including education and medical services.
To improve education in rural areas, distance-learning and resource-sharing have become an important measure. Schools in urban areas are pairing up with their rural counterparts. They send teachers or video classes to improve compulsory education in rural areas.
Telemedicine, online diagnosis and sharing of data between rural and urban hospitals have improved medical services in rural areas, especially those with underdeveloped transport. Over 1,000 township medical centers in Zhejiang and more than 200 county-level hospitals have formed more than 150 leading medical consortiums, which has helped improve the medical services.
Thanks to all these measures, today, all 11 prefecture-level cities in Zhejiang have reached near parity in the public services available in urban and rural areas. For basic social security and life services, the parity is over 99 percent.