Observer Report
Beijing
The post-Coronavirus “2020 CIFTIS—Summit Forum on Trends and Latest Developments of Digital Trade” held recently in Beijing has restored the confidence of overseas investors and the business community. Trade and investment opportunities look to boom in China.
The summit held at the National Convention Center not only restored the confidence of the national and international business leaders, it also showed China’s willingness to join hands with its international partners to jointly face the challenges.
The summit was jointly hosted by the Ministry of Commerce, the People’s Government of Beijing Municipality, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, China Association for Science and Technology and People’s Daily; and undertaken by the Chinese Institute of Electronics, China Academy of Industrial Internet and People’s Daily Digital Communication Co., Ltd.
Since COVID-19 yet to be brought under full control at the global level, all countries face the formidable task to defeat the virus, stabilize the economy, and protect livelihoods. “It is against such a backdrop that China decided to hold this important international trade event despite many difficulties in preparation. It shows China’s willingness to join hands with all of you in this trying time and work together to enable global trade in services to thrive and the world economy to recover at an early date,” said a senior official and one of the organizers of the summit.
Xiao Yaqing, Secretary of Party Leadership Group and Minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, introduced the development situation of China’s digital economy in his speech. In recent years, the scale of China’s digital economy has increased from 11 trillion to 35.8 trillion, accounting for 36.2% of the total GDP, which has become a vigorous support for high-quality development of the economy. The foundation of digital industrialization becomes more solid, the software industry develops rapidly, and the number of 5G users is up to 60 million. In addition, the progress of industrial digitization is speeding up, and the digital transformation of the manufacturing industry is advancing steadily. Meanwhile, international cooperation in the digital economy has been steadily promoted.
The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology will promote the high-quality development of the digital economy in China from the following four aspects. First, we shall promote digital industrialization and prepare high-quality industrial plans for big data and software during the “14th-Five Year Plan”.
We shall cultivate software industry ecology, promote industrial agglomeration, accelerate the construction of digital infrastructure and promote large-scale commercial layout of 5G. Second, we shall promote industrial digitization and the in-depth integration of informatization and industrialization, and deeply implement the innovation and development strategy of the industrial Internet. We shall accelerate the digital, network and intelligent transformation of the manufacturing industry.
We shall also promote construction of industrial Internet and big data centers and activate the potential of big data resource elements and cultivate the new state and mode of digital driving. Third, we shall serve for digital governance, promote the national standard of data management capability and establish an enterprise data management and evaluation system.
Ji Lin, Secretary of Party Leadership Group and Chairman of Beijing Municipal Committee of CPPCC said as the national science and technology innovation center, the added value of Beijing’s digital economy accounted for more than 50% of GDP in 2019, ranking first in the country.
Twenty-two Beijing enterprises were listed on the “Top 50 big data enterprises in China in 2019”, accounting for 44% of the country and ranking first in China. When comparing with the countries (regions) of global trade in services horizontally, Beijing ranks among the Top 20.
