The State Council Information Office published on Thursday a
white paper entitled China's Peaceful Development Road.
The document is composed of five chapters, i.e., Peaceful
Development Is the Inevitable Way for China's Modernization;
Promoting World Peace and Development with China's Own Growth;
Developing by Relying on Its Own Strength, Reform and Innovation;
Seeking Mutual Benefit and Common Development with Other Countries;
and Building a Harmonious World of Sustained Peace and Common
Prosperity.
Since the policies of reform and opening-up were introduced at
the end of the 1970s, China has successfully embarked on a road of
peaceful development compatible with its national conditions and
characteristics of the times. Along this road, the Chinese people
are working hard to build China into a prosperous, powerful,
democratic, civilized and harmonious modern country, and
continually making new contributions to human progress with China's
own development.
The white paper for the first time completely and
systematically clarifies the Chinese government's and people's
theory and practice in this regard.
The full text of the white paper follows:
China's Peaceful Development
Road
I. Peaceful Development Is the Inevitable
Way for China's Modernization
II. Promoting World Peace and Development with China's
Own Growth
III. Developing by Relying on Its Own Strength, Reform
and Innovation
IV. Seeking Mutual Benefit and Common Development with
Other Countries
V. Building a Harmonious World of Sustained Peace and
Common Prosperity
Conclusion
I. Peaceful Development Is the
Inevitable Way for China's Modernization
To achieve peaceful development is a sincere hope and
unremitting pursuit of the Chinese people. Since the policies of
reform and opening-up were introduced at the end of the 1970s,
China has successfully embarked on a road of peaceful development
compatible with its national conditions and characteristics of the
times. Along this road, the Chinese people are working hard to
build China into a prosperous, powerful, democratic, civilized and
harmonious modern country, and continually making new contributions
to human progress with China's own development.
Looking back upon history, basing itself on the present reality
and looking forward to the future, China will unswervingly follow
the road of peaceful development, making great efforts to achieve a
peaceful, open, cooperative and harmonious development.
- Striving for a peaceful international environment to develop
itself, and promoting world peace through its own development;
- Achieving development by relying on itself, together with
reform and innovation, while persisting in the policy of
opening-up;
- Conforming to the trend of economic globalization, and
striving to achieve mutually beneficial common development with
other countries;
- Sticking to peace, development and cooperation, and, together
with all other countries, devoting itself to building a harmonious
world marked by sustained peace and common prosperity.
Peace, opening-up, cooperation, harmony and win-win are our
policy, our idea, our principle and our pursuit. To take the road
of peaceful development is to unify domestic development with
opening to the outside world, linking the development of China with
that of the rest of the world, and combining the fundamental
interests of the Chinese people with the common interests of all
peoples throughout the world. China persists in its pursuit of
harmony and development internally while pursuing peace and
development externally; the two aspects, closely linked and
organically united, are an integrated whole, and will help to build
a harmonious world of sustained peace and common prosperity.
China's road of peaceful development is a brand-new one for
mankind in pursuit of civilization and progress, the inevitable way
for China to achieve modernization, and a serious choice and solemn
promise made by the Chinese government and the Chinese people.
- It is an inevitable choice based on its national
conditions that China persists unswervingly in taking the road of
peaceful development. During the 100-odd years
following the Opium War in 1840, China suffered humiliation and
insult from big powers. And thus, ever since the advent of modern
times, it has become the assiduously sought goal of the Chinese
people to eliminate war, maintain peace, and build a country of
independence and prosperity, and a comfortable and happy life for
the people. Although it has made enormous achievements in
development, China, with a large population, a weak economic
foundation and unbalanced development, is still the largest
developing country in the world. It is the central task of China to
promote economic and social development while continuously
improving its people's life. To stick to the road of peaceful
development is the inevitable way for China to attain national
prosperity and strength, and its people's happiness. What the
Chinese people need and cherish most is a peaceful international
environment. They are willing to do their best to make energetic
contributions for the common development of all countries.
- It is an inevitable choice based on China's historical
and cultural tradition that China persists unswervingly in taking
the road of peaceful development. The Chinese nation
has always been a peace-loving one. Chinese culture is a pacific
culture. The spirit of the Chinese people has always featured their
longing for peace and pursuit of harmony. Six hundred years ago,
Zheng He (1371-1435), the famous navigator of the Ming Dynasty, led
the then largest fleet in the world and made seven voyages to the
"Western Seas," reaching more than 30 countries and regions in Asia
and Africa. What he took to the places he visited were tea,
chinaware, silk and technology, but did not occupy an inch of any
other's land. What he brought to the outside world was peace and
civilization, which fully reflects the good faith of the ancient
Chinese people in strengthening exchanges with relevant countries
and their peoples. Based on the present reality, China's
development has not only benefited the 1.3 billion Chinese people,
but also brought large markets and development opportunities for
countries throughout the world. China's development also helps to
enhance the force for peace in the world.
- It is an inevitable choice based on the present world
development trend that China persists unswervingly in taking the
road of peaceful development. It is the common wish
of the people throughout the world and an irresistible historical
trend to pursue peace, promote development and seek cooperation. In
particular, further development of multi-polarization and economic
globalization has brought new opportunities for world peace and
development, and thus it is possible to strive for a long-term
peaceful international environment. Meanwhile, China is clearly
aware that the world is still troubled by many factors of
instability and uncertainty, and mankind still faces many severe
challenges. However, there are more opportunities than challenges,
and as long as all countries work together we can gradually attain
the goal of building a harmonious world of sustained peace and
common prosperity. For many years, China has consistently followed
an independent foreign policy of peace, the purpose of which is to
safeguard world peace and promote common development. As early as
in 1974, when China resumed its membership in the United Nations,
Deng Xiaoping proclaimed to the world that China would never seek
hegemony. Since the policies of reform and opening-up were
introduced, China, keeping in view the changes in the international
situation, has upheld the important strategic judgment that peace
and development are the theme of the present times, and declared on
many occasions that China did not seek hegemony in the past, nor
does it now, and will not do so in the future when it gets
stronger. China's development will never pose a threat to anyone;
instead, it can bring more development opportunities and bigger
markets for the rest of the world. Facts prove that China's
economic development is becoming an important impetus for economic
growth in the Asia-Pacific region and even the world as a whole. It
has become the national determination of China to safeguard world
peace and promote common development.
At present, the Chinese people are working hard to build a
moderately well-off society in an all-round way. Not long ago, the
Fifth Plenary Session of the 16th Central Committee of the
Communist Party of China set the main targets for China's economic
and social development from 2006 to 2010, of which the principal
economic target is to double the 2000 per-capita GDP by 2010 on the
basis of optimizing its structures, increasing economic returns and
reducing consumption; and enhance substantially the resource
utilization ratio, and by 2010 reduce the 2005 per-unit GDP
resource consumption by around 20 percent. To attain this target,
China, guided by the scientific concept of development with people
first, overall coordination and sustainable development at the
core, will promote the overall development of its economy,
politics, culture and society. While seeking development by relying
primarily on its own strength, China sticks to the policy of
opening-up, engages in extensive international economic and
technological cooperation, and shares with all other countries the
fruits of mankind's civilization; respects and gives consideration
to others' interests, works with other countries to solve the
disputes and problems cropping up in cooperation, and strives to
achieve mutual benefit and common development; abides by its
international obligations and commitments, actively participates in
international systems and world affairs, and endeavors to play a
constructive and locomotive role; and gets along with all other
countries equally and develops friendly relations with them on the
basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.
II. Promoting World Peace and
Development with China's Own Growth
Peace is the foundation for development while development is
fundamental for peace. For years, the Chinese government and people
have made unremitting efforts to create a peaceful international
environment. They cherish dearly the peaceful international
environment jointly created by the peace-loving and
progress-seeking countries and peoples, concentrate on their own
construction and whole-heartedly seek development, and strive
constantly to make positive contributions to world peace and
development with their own growth, and promote human civilization
and progress.
China's development needs a peaceful international environment.
Since 1978, when the policies of reform and opening-up were
adopted, China has endeavored to develop itself within a peaceful
international environment. Its GDP has increased from 362.4 billion
yuan (about US$215.3 billion if converted directly from Renminbi
into US dollar at the average exchange rate of that year) to
15,987.8 billion yuan (about US$1931.7 billion if converted
directly from Renminbi into US dollar at the average exchange rate
of that year) in 2004, an average growth rate of over 9 percent per
annum, calculated according to constant price. Its per-capita GDP
has risen from less than US$300 to more than US$1,400. China has
also made new progress in its building of political civilization,
with its democratic system being improved continuously, the freedom
and rights of citizens being protected and guaranteed by law, and
its people exercising their rights of democratic election,
decision-making, administration and supervision in accordance with
the law. A legal system centered on the Constitution has taken
initial shape, and the basic strategy of ruling the country by law
has been implemented. Rapid progress has been scored in its
education, science and technology, culture, health, sports and
other undertakings, and the increasing spiritual and cultural needs
of the people have been constantly satisfied. The construction of a
harmonious society has been reinforced, and the state is working
hard to realize and safeguard social fairness and justice, increase
creativity of the whole society, beef up social construction and
administration, and maintain social stability and harmonious
relations between man and Nature.
China's development is an important component of global
development. China has promoted world peace with its own
development and made contributions to the progress of mankind.
China has made contributions to the sustained development of
human society. Based on previous experience and the fruits of
modern civilization of mankind, it has adopted the scientific
outlook on development to transform its concepts, create new modes
for growth and enhance the quality of development. Over the years,
China has persisted in exploring a new road to industrialization,
featuring high scientific and technological content, good economic
returns, low resources consumption, little environmental pollution
and a full display of advantages in human resources, and striven to
steer the entire society along a road of sustained development of
civilization, with advanced production, affluent life and favorable
ecological conditions. China's success in population control has
retarded the expansion of the population of the world as a whole.
China emphasizes energy saving, and has adopted various measures in
this regard. During the period 1980-2000, its GDP quadrupled, but
the annual consumption of energy only doubled. Due to China's
intensified efforts at environmental protection, its dust discharge
has remained the same as in 1980 despite a big increase in
installed thermal-power capacity. Its energy consumption of per
10,000-yuan GDP in 2004 dropped by 45 percent compared to 1990.
China has made medium- and long-term plans for energy conservation,
aiming to keep an annual energy-saving rate of 3 percent by 2020,
to save 1.4 billion tons of standard coal.
China has made contributions to reducing human poverty and
improving the quality of life. It has created a miracle by feeding
nearly 22 percent of the world's population on less than 10 percent
of the world's arable land. The living standards of its 1.3 billion
people are constantly improving. The Chinese government has lifted
220 million people out of poverty, and provided minimum living
allowances to 22.05 million urban residents and aid to 60 million
disabled people. The life expectancy of the Chinese has been
extended from 35 years before New China was founded in 1949 to
71.95 years today, close to that of moderately developed
countries.
China has made contributions to safeguarding world peace and
promoting international cooperation. On the basis of the Five
Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, China has developed friendly,
cooperative relations with other countries and promoted peaceful
coexistence and equal treatment among countries. China has always
adhered to the principle of being a friendly neighbor; and has
constantly developed good and cooperative relationships with
surrounding countries and other Asian countries and expanded common
interests with them. China has established various cooperative
relationships with major powers, and unremittingly augmented mutual
dialogues, exchanges and cooperation. China has also expedited
cooperation with a vast number of developing countries, to seek
common development by drawing on one another's advantages within
the South-South cooperation framework. Active in the settlement of
serious international and regional problems, China shoulders broad
international obligations, and plays a responsible and constructive
role.
China has made contributions to world economic development. In
recent years, despite increasingly severe global economic
fluctuations, China's economy has maintained a stable and
relatively fast growth, bringing hope and a new driving force to
world economic development. Statistics released by the World Bank
show that China's economic growth contributed on average 13 percent
to world economic growth from 2000 to 2004. In 2004, the world
economy reported the swiftest growth in 30 years, while China's
economy grew by 9.5 percent and became a key driving force for the
former. Also in 2004, China's import and export figure doubled that
of three years previously, reaching US$1,154.8 billion, and its
import figure nearly doubled that of three years previously,
reaching US$561.4 billion. By the end of 2004, China had made use
of US$745.3 billion paid-in foreign capital, and approved more than
500,000 foreign-funded enterprises.
China has made contributions to the stable development of
surrounding areas. China has more than 20 neighbors that either
border on its territory or lie across the nearby seas. China's
sustained economic growth, social stability and its people's
peaceful life also benefit its neighboring countries. The
Asia-Pacific economy kept a 6-percent growth between 1999 and 2004.
To ensure a stable environment for the continuous development of
its surrounding areas, China overcame arduous difficulties at the
time of the 1997 Asian financial crisis, and stuck to the principle
of keeping the value of the Renminbi stable while expanding
domestic demand, and helped to the best of its ability the victim
countries to weather the crisis. China played its role in finally
overcoming the crisis. In the case of the 2003 sudden outbreak of
SARS, the Chinese government took decisive steps, and cooperated
with its neighbors in effectively curbing it. Upon the occurrence
of the Indian Ocean tsunami in late 2004, the Chinese government
and its people offered timely and sincere aid - the largest
external aid in the history of New China - to the suffering
countries in their rescue and re-construction effort. The Chinese
also expressed great sympathy and extended assistance when South
Asia was struck by massive earthquakes in October 2005.
Despite gigantic achievements, China still remains the largest
developing country in the world, with a formidable task of
development lying ahead. According to the latest statistics
released by the World Bank and statistics recently released by
China, in 2004, China's aggregate economic volume accounted only
for 16.6 percent of that of the US, and its per-capita GDP was
merely 3.6 percent that of the US and 4.0 percent of Japan, ranking
129th among 208 countries and regions around the world. By the end
of 2004, 26.1 million rural Chinese still lived under the poverty
line, more than 100 million farmers have to be provided with jobs
elsewhere, and the government is obliged to create jobs for nearly
24 million urban and rural residents every year. There is still a
long way to go for China to reach the level of the moderately
developed countries and achieve common prosperity for the whole
country. China still needs to make persistent efforts to strive for
a peaceful international environment for its own development, and
promote world peace and development with its own growth. This is
particularly significant for both China and the world as a
whole.
III. Developing by Relying on
Its Own Strength, Reform and Innovation
China will adhere to the scientific approach for development and
have an overall plan for domestic development and opening to the
outside world, and base its development on its own realities. At
the same time, China will maintain the approach of all-round,
wide-area, multi-level openness to the outside world, striving to
attain a more balanced development.
The main problem facing China in its development is the
contradiction between its underdeveloped economy and its people's
ever-increasing material and cultural demands, and the
contradiction between economic and social development and the
relatively strong pressure of the population, natural resources and
the environment. Past experience indicates that fundamentally China
must rely on itself to solve the problems in its development. By
doing so, the country will be responsible to the Chinese people as
well as to the people of the rest of the world. It is an important
principle that guarantees that China will follow the road of
peaceful development. China will not shift its own problems and
contradictions onto other countries, much less will it plunder
other countries to further its own development.
To achieve development, China will mainly rely on its own
strength, reform and innovation. It has many advantages and
favorable conditions: It has the material and technological
foundation supporting further economic development; it has an
ever-growing huge market and a high rate of private savings
deposits; it has a large labor force whose quality, as a whole, is
improving all the time; it has an ever-improving socialist economic
market system and related policy guarantee; and it has a stable
social and political environment.
China intends to do the following work well in order to achieve
development by mainly relying on its own strength and through
reform and innovation:
- Adhering to innovation in ideas and
systems. Practice over the two decades or so since
China introduced the reform and opening-up policies has proved
that, by emancipating the mind, seeking truth from facts and
striving for progress, China is able to bring into full play the
enthusiasm, initiative and creativity of its hundreds of millions
of people and open up new prospects for its modernization drive.
China will unswervingly push forward reform in all aspects, remain
steadfast in the direction of socialist market economy in its
reform, intensify reform with emphasis on institutional innovation,
and strive to make breakthroughs in some key areas and important
links. Through reform, China will enhance marketization of its
national economy, improve the state's macroeconomic regulatory
system, and constantly establish institutions and mechanisms
conducive to an overall, coordinated and sustainable economic and
social development.
- Opening up the domestic market and increasing domestic
demand. It is China's fundamental stand and long-term
strategic guiding principle to expand domestic demand in its
economic and social development. China has entered a period when
the pace of industrialization and urbanization is being quickened,
the people's income level is increasing and their consumption
structure is being upgraded. While changing its mode of foreign
trade growth, increasing imports and strengthening intellectual
property protection, and continuing to make contributions to global
trade and the world economy, China keeps up its driving force to
maintain sustained economic development through its huge domestic
demand and domestic market. This has determined that China should
and most likely will mainly rely on domestic demand for its
development. China will ensure that investment in fixed assets will
increase at a reasonable scale and pace so as to bring into better
play the role of investment in economic growth. By implementing
correct income distribution and consumption policies, China is
relying more on domestic demand and consumption to promote its
economic development. In recent years, domestic investment and
consumption needs are increasing at a rather rapid rate.
- Promoting the strategic adjustment of the economic
structure and the change of growth mode. China
considers changing the growth mode a strategic focal point, strives
to base economic growth on the enhancement of the quality of its
human resources, efficient use of natural resources, reduction of
environmental pollution, and emphasis on the quality and efficiency
of its economy. China will take a new road of industrialization -
using the IT industry to promote industrialization and letting
industrialization support the development of the IT industry. It
will quicken the pace of optimizing and upgrading its industrial
structure, develop advanced manufacturing industry, high- and
new-tech industry, especially the IT and biological industries,
increase the proportion of the service sector and improve the level
of services, strengthen the construction of infrastructure
facilities of basic industries, and bring into full play the
function of structural readjustment in the change of the growth
mode. China will work hard to develop a cost-saving, recycling and
environment-friendly economy, establishing a national economic
system characterized by intensification and cleanness.
- Promoting scientific and technological progress and
strengthening the ability of independent
innovation. China is striving to become a country of
innovation, and it is a state strategy to strengthen the ability of
independent innovation. It has made medium- and long-term
scientific and technological development plans, setting forth the
objectives and tasks for scientific and technological development
for the next 15 years. China is making every effort to enhance its
ability of original innovation, integrated innovation and
re-innovation after absorbing advanced technology from abroad. By
reforming the scientific and technological system and increasing
financial input through various channels, China will promote the
construction of its national innovation system and speed up the
pace of commercialization of research findings. China hopes to
increase the proportion of funds for scientific and technological
research and development from 1.44 percent of the GDP in 2004 to
2.5 percent in 2020.
- Making every effort to exploit human
resources. China will make effort in implementing the
strategy of relying on talented people to make the country
powerful. It will quicken the readjustment of the educational
structure and institute education aimed at all-round development of
students, with emphasis being put on compulsory education,
especially compulsory education in the countryside. It will make
greater efforts to develop vocational education and raise the
quality of its higher education, so as to greatly promote the
development of education and foster qualified workers and
specialized personnel in all fields. It is expected that from 2006
to 2010 the secondary vocational schools will train 25 million
graduates, and the higher vocational schools 11 million graduates
for the society. The enrolment rate of China's institutions of
higher learning will reach 40 percent by 2020. Meanwhile, China
will bring in talented personnel, especially high-level personnel,
from abroad, forming a favorable mechanism and social atmosphere in
which talented people keep emerging in large numbers and every
individual gives full play to his or her talents, thus providing
abundant human resources and intellectual support for the country's
modernization program.
- Working hard to build a resource-saving and
environment-friendly society. Historical experiences
show that to have a balanced and orderly development of the world
economy, the international community must handle the energy problem
properly. Through dialogues and cooperation regarding energy, China
is working with other countries to safeguard energy safety and
stability. China considers energy saving one of its basic state
policies. Centering on conservation of energy resources and raising
the efficiency of energy consumption, China is working hard to
develop a recycling economy so that it will garner the highest
possible economic and social benefits with the lowest possible
energy consumption. China has persisted in relying on its domestic
resources and constantly increasing the supply of domestic energy.
China is not only a big energy consuming country, but also a big
energy producing one. Since the 1990s, China has obtained 90
percent or more of its energy from domestic sources. The potential
of its domestic energy supply is still great. Verified coal
reserves account for only a small proportion of the potential
reserves. Moreover, it is likely that new oilfields and natural gas
fields will be discovered, and the future of new types of energy
and regenerated energy is promising. Meanwhile, China upholds the
basic state policy of environmental protection, and is making more
and more efforts to protect and improve its ecological environment,
so as to create conditions for sustainable economic and social
development. In its environmental protection efforts, China
persists in putting precautionary measures first, treating
environmental pollution comprehensively and preventing pollution at
the source. China gives priority to environmental protection, makes
sure that the exploitation of natural resources is in good order,
emphasizes prevention of excessive exploitation of natural
resources, and intensifies protection of natural resources and
ecology.
China will unswervingly carry out the basic state policy of
opening up to the outside world, and actively engage in economic
and technological exchanges and cooperation with other countries to
raise the overall level of openness. China has earnestly fulfilled
the promises it made when admitted into the World Trade
Organization (WTO) by constantly improving the management system
and policies concerning foreign businesses in China and creating a
fair and predictable legal environment; opening the market further
and improving the environment for investment and trade; improving
the trade structure, enhancing the degree of freedom and
convenience for trade and investment, and creating a better
environment for investment; and, in addition, encouraging its own
enterprises to invest overseas and developing alongside foreign
businesses. Opening up to the outside world has played a very
important role in promoting China's economic and social
development. The foreign capital China brings in makes up for the
inadequacy of capital for development. Domestic industries have
been growing rapidly thanks to the full utilization of overseas
markets. The introduction of advanced technology, equipment and
management expertise has improved the production technology and
management level of Chinese enterprises. Frequent exchanges with
other countries make it possible for China to share the fruits of
mankind's civilization and improve the quality of its own human
resources.
IV. Seeking Mutual Benefit and
Common Development with Other Countries
China cannot develop independently without the rest of the
world. Likewise, the world needs China if it is to attain
prosperity. Following the trend of economic globalization, China is
participating in international economic and technological
cooperation on an ever larger scale, in wider areas and at higher
levels in an effort to push economic globalization towards the
direction of common prosperity for all countries. Today, the
mainstream of international trade is to share successes, with all
as winners. China adheres to its opening-up strategy for mutual
benefit. For this, it has made conforming to China's own interests
while promoting common development a basic principle guiding its
foreign economic and trade work, develops its economic and trade
relations with other countries on the basis of equality, mutual
benefit and reciprocity, and makes constant contributions to the
sustained growth of global trade.
China has exerted itself to push forward multilateral economic
and trade relations and regional economic cooperation, actively
participated in the formulation and execution of international
economic and trade rules, and joined various other countries in
settling disputes and problems emerging in their cooperation, so as
to promote the balanced and orderly development of the world
economy.
China has been an active supporter of and participant in
multilateral trade system. Since its accession to the WTO in
December 2001, China has strictly kept its commitments to create
more favorable conditions for international economic and
technological cooperation. China has sorted out and revised some
3,000 laws, regulations and department rules, continually improved
its foreign-related economic legal system, and enhanced the
transparency of its trade policies. China has cut its customs
tariffs step by step, as promised, and by 2005 its average tariffs
had been reduced to 9.9 percent, and most non-tariff measures had
been cancelled. Banking, insurance, securities, distribution and
other service trade sectors have opened wider to the outside world.
Of the 160-odd service trade sectors listed by the WTO, China has
opened more than 100, or 62.5 percent, a level close to that of the
developed countries. China has actively pushed ahead with a new
round of multilateral trade negotiations, participated in talks on
various topics, especially on agriculture, market access of
non-farm products and the service trades, and played a constructive
role in helping developing and developed members reduce disputes
through talks. China, together with other WTO members, has done a
lot of work to spur substantial progress to reach early agreement
among the negotiators.
China has continuously stepped up participation in regional
economic cooperation. The building of the China-ASEAN Free Trade
Area is going full steam ahead. Following the practice of zero
tariffs on farm products under the "Early Harvest Program," the
Agreements on Trade in Goods and the Dispute Settlement Mechanism
Agreement were formally signed in November 2004, and in July 2005
the free trade area launched its tariff concession program,
clearing the way for realizing its goals. At present, the building
of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization is proceeding with
comprehensive and pragmatic cooperation, and its process to
facilitate trade investment has been launched in an all-round way.
China has also initiated negotiations on such free trade areas as
the China-Southern African Development Community, China-Gulf
Cooperation Council, and China-New Zealand, China-Chile,
China-Australia and China-Pakistan, and signed relevant agreements
with its partners. China is also an active and pragmatic
participant in the activities of the Asia-Pacific Economic
Cooperation, Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, Sino-Arab
Cooperation Forum, Asia-Europe Meeting and Greater Mekong Subregion
Economic Cooperation Program. China advocates the liberalization
and facilitation of investment in bilateral trade, and has signed
bilateral trade agreements or protocols with more than 150
countries and regions, bilateral investment protection agreements
with more than 110 countries, and agreements with over 80 countries
on the avoidance of double tariffs.
China sticks to the principle of mutual benefit and win-win
cooperation, tries to find proper settlement of trade conflicts and
promotes common development with other countries. Trade conflicts
are quite natural in international economic exchanges. Following
international practice and WTO rules, China has tried to resolve
such conflicts through dialogue on an equal footing and through the
WTO dispute settlement mechanism. When promulgating and
implementing domestic economic policies, it tries to take
international factors and influences into account as well as the
impacts its own economic growth imposes on the outside world. Based
on its reform and development, China is serious in judging the
effects its exchange rate reform may bring to surrounding countries
and regions, and the global economy and finance. It has thus
advanced the reform in a steady way, adopted a managed floating
exchange rate regime based on market supply and demand, and linked
and adjusted it according to a basket of currencies, so that the
Renminbi exchange rate will remain stable at a reasonable and
balanced level. China has intensified its protection of
intellectual property rights, improved the relevant legal system,
and tightened up law enforcement to crack down on all kinds of
violations.
Growing China is active in international economic and
technological cooperation, and provides good opportunities and a
huge market for the rest of the world. All countries, the developed
countries in particular, have reaped lucrative benefits from
investment in and service trade with China.
China's active involvement in the international division of
labor and cooperation is conducive to the reasonable and effective
distribution of global resources. As the largest developing country
in the world, China boasts an abundant labor force, the quality of
which has been constantly improving. It is a natural advantage of
China in developing labor-intensive industries and some
technology-intensive ones. Along with economic and social progress,
as well as the improvement of the living standards of its people,
China's demand for capital-, technology- and knowledge-intensive
products keeps increasing, offering great opportunities for foreign
products, technologies and services, as the country has now evolved
into an internationally acknowledged big market. China's foreign
trade is mutually supplementary with many countries. About 70
percent of China's exports to the US, Japan and the Europe Union
(EU) are labor-intensive, while 80 percent of its imports from the
three are capital-, technology- and knowledge-intensive. In the new
structure of international labor division, the country has become a
key link in the global industrial chain.
By importing cheap but good-quality products made in China, the
importing countries can reduce their expenditure and pressure
caused by inflation while satisfying the demands and enhancing the
welfare of their consumers. China's labor-intensive products enjoy
unique comparative advantages in the global market. Since 1997, US
consumers have saved billions of dollars every year by buying
Chinese commodities - US$600 billion in the past decade and nearly
US$100 billion in 2004 alone.
The expansion of China's reciprocal economic and trade relations
with other countries has benefited both in a tremendous way.
China's imports have kept growing by a yearly 16 percent since
1978, and the country imported commodities worth US$1,270 billion
in the three transitional years following its WTO accession. In
2004, China became the world's third largest importer, next only to
the US and Germany, with US$148.47 billion of increased imports or
9 percent of the world's total growth of imports. Also in 2004,
China's trade volume with the EU, the US and Japan totaled US$177.3
billion, US$169.6 billion and US$167.8 billion, respectively,
making them China's top three trade partners and main sources of
foreign investment. In the same year, China's trade volume with
Asian countries and regions amounted to US$664.9 billion, 34.2
percent up over that of the previous year. This figure accounted
for 57.6 percent of China's total foreign trade value. In addition,
China has become the fourth largest trading partner of and a
fast-growing market for ASEAN.
The huge market of China offers such great opportunities for
international capital that investors around the world have
benefited from China's rapid economic growth. From 1990 to 2004,
foreign investors repatriated US$250.6 billion in profits from
China. In 2004, US-funded enterprises in China generated US$75
billion in sales revenue in China, and their products earned
another US$75 billion elsewhere. A 2005 survey by the American
Chamber of Commerce-People's Republic of China shows that 70
percent of American firms are making profits in China, and about 42
percent report a higher profit rate than their global average.
China's growing investment abroad has also fueled the economies
of the destination countries. At the end of 2004, China's net
non-banking direct investment abroad amounted to US$44.8 billion,
spreading to 149 countries and regions. Among which, US$33.4
billion, or 75 percent, went to Asia.
China's foreign economic and trade cooperation has tremendous
potential and boosts bright prospects. In the post-WTO era, China
imported US$500 billion worth of commodities annually during the
period from December 2001 to September 2005, which meant 10 million
jobs for the countries and regions concerned. In the next few
years, it will import US$600 billion worth of goods annually, and
the amount will exceed US$1,000 billion by 2010. By 2020, the scale
and total demand of the Chinese market will quadruple that in 2000.
During the process, the rest of the world will find development and
business opportunities in their reciprocal cooperation with China,
which will greatly accelerate the growth of the global economy.
V. Building a Harmonious World
of Sustained Peace and Common Prosperity
Mankind has only one home - the Earth. Building a harmonious
world of sustained peace and common prosperity is a common wish of
the people throughout the world as well as the lofty goal of China
in taking the road of peaceful development.
China holds that the harmonious world should be democratic,
harmonious, just, and tolerant.
- Upholding democracy and equality to achieve
coordination and cooperation. All countries should,
on the basis of the UN Charter and the Five Principles of Peaceful
Coexistence, promote democracy in international relations through
dialogue, communication and cooperation. The internal affairs of a
country should be decided by its people, international affairs
should be discussed and solved by all countries on an equal
footing, and developing countries ought to enjoy the equal right to
participate in and make decisions on international affairs. All
countries should respect each other and treat each other equally.
No country is entitled to impose its own will upon others, or
maintain its security and development at the price of the interests
of others. The international community should oppose unilateralism,
advocate and promote multilateralism, and make the UN and its
Security Council play a more active role in international affairs.
When dealing with international relations, it is necessary to
persist in proceeding from the common interests of all the people
throughout the world, make efforts to expand common interests,
enhance understanding through communication, strengthen cooperation
through understanding and create a win-win situation through
cooperation.
- Upholding harmony and mutual trust to realize common
security. All countries should join hands to respond
to threats against world security. We should abandon the Cold War
mentality, cultivate a new security concept featuring mutual trust,
mutual benefit, equality and coordination, build a fair and
effective collective security mechanism aimed at jointly preventing
conflict and war, and cooperate to eliminate or reduce as much as
possible threats from such non-traditional security problems as
terrorist activities, financial crises and natural disasters, so as
to safeguard world peace, security and stability. We should persist
in settling international disputes and conflicts peacefully through
consultations and negotiations on the basis of equality, work
together to oppose acts of encroachment on the sovereignty of other
countries, interference in the internal affairs of other countries,
and willful use or threat of use of military force. We should step
up cooperation in a resolute fight against terrorism, stamp out
both the symptoms and root causes of the problem of terrorism, with
special emphasis on eliminating the root cause of the menace. We
should achieve effective disarmament and arms control in a fair,
rational, comprehensive and balanced fashion, prevent the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, vigorously promote
the international nuclear disarmament process, and maintain global
strategic stability.
- Upholding fairness and mutual benefit to achieve
common development. In the process of economic
globalization, we should stick to the principle of fairness,
achieve balanced and orderly development, and benefit all
countries, developing countries in particular, instead of further
widening of the gap between South and North. We should propel
economic globalization towards the direction of common prosperity.
The developed countries should shoulder greater responsibility for
a universal, coordinated and balanced development of the world,
while the developing countries should make full use of their own
advantages to achieve development. We should actively further trade
and investment liberalization and facilitation, remove all kinds of
trade barriers, increase market access, ease restrictions on
technology export, so as to establish an international multilateral
trading system that is public, fair, rational, transparent, open
and nondiscriminatory, and construct a good trading environment
conducive to orderly global economic development. We should further
improve the international financial system to create a stable and
highly efficient financial environment conducive to global economic
growth. We should step up worldwide dialogue and cooperation on
energy, and jointly maintain energy security and energy market
stability. We should actively promote and guarantee human rights to
ensure that everyone enjoys equal opportunities and right to pursue
overall development. We should make innovations in the mode of
development, promote the harmonious development of man and Nature,
and take the road of sustainable development.
- Upholding tolerance and opening to achieve dialogue
among civilizations. Diversity of civilizations is a
basic feature of human society, and an important driving force for
the progress of mankind. All countries should respect other
country's right to independently choose their own social systems
and paths of development, learn from one another and draw on the
strong points of others to make up for their own weak points, thus
achieving rejuvenation and development in line with their own
national conditions. Dialogues and exchanges among civilizations
should be encouraged with the aim of doing away with misgivings and
estrangement existing between civilizations, and develop together
by seeking common ground while putting aside differences, so as to
make mankind more harmonious and the world more colorful. We should
endeavor to preserve the diversity of civilizations and development
patterns, and jointly build a harmonious world where all
civilizations coexist and accommodate one another.
Over the years, China has persisted in the policies of peace,
development and cooperation, and pursued an independent foreign
policy of peace. In the spirit of democracy, harmony, justice and
tolerance, China has been playing a constructive role, and making
efforts to attain the lofty goal of building a harmonious world
together with all other countries.
China is working hard to bring about a just and rational new
international political and economic order, and stands for greater
democracy in international relations. China adheres to the purpose
and principles of the UN Charter, attaches great importance to the
UN's role in international affairs as the core of the international
multilateral mechanism, vigorously promotes multilateral
cooperation to settle regional conflicts and development problems,
and actively supports the UN to play a greater role in
international affairs. China backs up UN reform, and firmly helps
safeguard its long-term interests and the common interests of its
members. China has joined more than 130 inter-governmental
international organizations, including the International Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA), is committed to 267 international
multilateral treaties such as the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation
of Nuclear Weapons, and actively participates in international
cooperation in such fields as anti-terrorism, arms control,
non-proliferation, peacekeeping, economy and trade, development,
human rights, law-enforcement, and the environment.
China takes practical steps to establish fraternal relations
with surrounding regions and promote cooperation in maintaining
regional security. In line with the generally acknowledged
principles of international law and in the spirit of consultation
on the basis of equality, mutual understanding and mutual
accommodation, China has made efforts to properly resolve boundary
issues with neighboring countries, settle disputes and promote
stability. So far, thanks to joint efforts with various countries,
China has signed boundary treaties with 12 continental neighbors,
settling boundary issues left over from history. The boundary
issues with India and Bhutan are in the process of being settled.
China actively promotes dialogue and cooperation on regional
security, and plays a positive and constructive role in such
regional mechanisms as ASEAN + China, ASEAN + China, Japan and the
ROK, Shanghai Cooperation Organization, Asia Pacific Economic
Cooperation, ASEAN Regional Forum, and Asian Cooperation Dialogue.
China has joined the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast
Asia, lending new vitality to the peaceful and friendly
relationship between China and ASEAN members.
China plays a constructive role in resolving weighty
international and regional issues for common security. With respect
to the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula, China has worked
tirelessly with the other relevant parties, and succeeded in
convening and hosting first the Three-Party Talks (China, North
Korea and the United States) and then the Six-Party Talks (China,
North Korea, the United States, the Republic of Korea, Russia and
Japan). China was instrumental in getting the participants to issue
a joint statement, thus mitigating tension on the peninsula, and
contributing constructively to peace and stability in Northeast
Asia. Regarding the Middle East issue, China encourages the parties
involved to resume talks and start a new peace process based on
relevant UN resolutions and the principle of "Land for Peace." As
for the Iraq issue, China advocates seeking a political solution
within the UN framework, and is making great efforts in this
regard. On the Iran nuclear issue, China has tried several
approaches to persuade the parties involved to engage in dialogue
and find a proper and peaceful settlement within the IAEA
framework. Moreover, China is expanding its participation in UN
peacekeeping efforts, having sent military personnel, police and
civil officers on 14 UN peacekeeping missions, to the number of
3,000.
For many years, China has provided assistance within its
capacity to other developing countries to help them build the
capacity for self-development as well as engage in common
development. So far, China has provided assistance to more than 110
countries and regional organizations for over 2,000 projects. China
has reduced or canceled 198 debts totaling 16.6 billion yuan owed
to it by 44 developing countries. In May 2005, the International
Poverty-Reduction Center in China was formally set up in Beijing.
In September 2005, at the High-Level Meeting on Financing for
Development, on the occasion of the 60th Anniversary of the United
Nations, President Hu Jintao announced the new measures China would
adopt to increase assistance to other developing countries: China
will give zero tariff treatment for certain products to all the 39
Least-Developed Countries (LDCs) having diplomatic relations with
China, covering most commodities exported by these countries to
China; further expand aid to Heavily Indebted Poor Countries
(HIPCs) and LDCs; through bilateral channels, exempt or cancel in
other ways within the next two years of all the outstanding
interest-free and low-interest government loans due as of the end
of 2004 owed by all the HIPCs having diplomatic relations with
China; within the next three years, provide US$10 billion in
preferential loans and preferential export buyer's credit to
developing countries to help them strengthen the construction of
infrastructure, promote enterprises of both sides to carry out
joint venture cooperation; within the next three years, increase
aid to developing countries, particularly aid to African countries
in related areas, provide to them medicines including effective
drugs to prevent malaria, help them build and improve medical
facilities and train medical personnel; and train 30,000 persons of
various professions from the developing countries within the next
three years, and help relevant countries expedite the training of
talented people.
China continuously enhances exchanges and dialogues with other
civilizations to promote mutual tolerance. Opening, tolerance and
all-embracing are important features of Chinese civilization. As
the trend of economic globalization develops in depth, China, all
the more aware of the significance of exchanges and dialogues among
different civilizations, is working harder to get the rest of the
world to understand China, while absorbing and drawing on the
useful fruits of other civilizations. In recent years, China has
cooperated with numerous countries in holding Culture Weeks,
Culture Tours, Culture Festivals and Culture Years, thus helping
promote exchanges and understanding between the Chinese people and
other peoples, and creating new forms for equal dialogue between
civilizations.
Conclusion
China is the largest developing country in the world. The 1.3
billion Chinese people, taking the road of peaceful development,
undoubtedly play a critical and positive role in the lofty pursuit
of the peace and development of mankind.
The Chinese government and people are well aware that China is
still a developing country facing a lot of difficulties and
problems on its road of development, and therefore it still has a
long way to go before modernization is achieved. The road of
peaceful development accords with the fundamental interests of the
Chinese people; it also conforms to the objective requirements of
social development and progress of mankind. China is now taking the
road of peaceful development, and will continue to do so when it
gets stronger in the future. The resolve of the Chinese government
and the Chinese people to stick to the road of peaceful development
is unshakable.
The Chinese government and people also see clearly that peace
and development, the two overriding issues facing the world, have
not yet been fundamentally achieved. Local wars and conflicts
arising from various causes keep erupting. Problems and conflicts
in some regions remain complicated and thorny. Traditional and
non-traditional factors threatening security are intertwined. The
wealth gap between North and South continues to widen. People in
some countries are still being denied the basic right to
subsistence, and even survival. All this has made the road leading
to a harmonious world characterized by sustained peace and common
prosperity a bumpy and challenging one, and reaching the goal
demands long and unremitting efforts by the people throughout the
world.
The 21st century has opened up bright prospects, and human
society is developing at an unprecedented rate. China has
identified its goal for the first 20 years of this century. That
is, to build a moderately well-off society in an all-round way that
benefits over one billion people, further develop China's economy,
improve democracy, advance science and education, enrich culture,
foster greater social harmony and upgrade the quality of life of
the Chinese people. China is certain to make more contributions to
the lofty cause of peace and development of mankind.
(China.org.cn December 22, 2005)