Bloomberg News: 

How does the Chinese government plan to reduce its dependence on foreign imports of resources such as iron ore, crude oil, natural gas and soybeans with the aim of becoming a more self-sufficient economy?

Zhao Chenxin:

Thank you for your question, and I will take it. It concerns a very important issue, that is, how to understand creating a new development pattern. Since the Party Central Committee put forward this major strategic plan, we have noticed that there are some misconceptions and misunderstandings. Mr. Sun Yeli, spokesperson for the 20th CPC National Congress, answered a similar question at the press conference the day before yesterday. I would like to take this opportunity to expound on the goals and requirements of creating a new development pattern.

Since 2020, General Secretary Xi Jinping has made important expositions on creating a new development pattern on many occasions. We must fully and faithfully apply the new development philosophy on all fronts, continue reforms to develop the socialist market economy, promote high-standard opening up, and accelerate efforts to foster a new pattern of development that is focused on the domestic economy and features positive interplay between domestic and international economic flows, the general secretary said yesterday in a report at the opening session of the 20th CPC National Congress. Creating a new development pattern is a major decision made by the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core on the basis of a thorough analysis of the situation and in line with the changes to China's development stage, development environment, and development conditions, in particular, the changes to China's comparative advantages. It is a systematic and profound transformation that bears on the overall situation. It is also a strategic plan based on the present and with a long-term perspective. It is of great and far-reaching significance for China to achieve higher-quality development that is more efficient, equitable, sustainable, and secure.

Some people at home and abroad said that "taking the domestic circulation as the mainstay" means that China would significantly shrink its opening up to the outside world and even engage in a self-sufficient economy. Such understanding is wrong. General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly stressed fostering a new development pattern that has open and dual domestic circulation and international circulation, not a closed single domestic circulation. In the current world, the trend of economic globalization is irreversible, and no country can build itself behind closed doors. China has long been deeply integrated with the global economy and the international system and has a high degree of industrial connection and interdependence with many other countries. The internal and external markets are interdependent and mutually reinforcing. Over the past 40-plus years since reform and opening up, we have actively leveraged domestic and overseas markets to create conditions for promoting a market economy, enriching market supplies, driving the transformation and upgrading of the industrial structure, sharpening competitive edges in the international market, and comprehensively enhancing the composite national strength, all of which has effectively improved the quality and allocation of China's production factors and promoted efficiency and quality of the domestic circulation.

For a while, economic globalization has been encountering "headwinds and adverse currents," and some countries want to engage in "decoupling and chain-cutting" in order to build the so-called "small courtyard and high walls." But the world will never return to a state of isolation and division. Opening up and cooperation remain the historical trend, and mutual benefits and win-win results are still what people are longing for. China's economy is a sea, and the world economy is also a sea. The oceans and seas in the world are all connected. We will always stand on the right side of history and will never be hindered by headwinds and turning-back waves. We will hold high the banner of building a community with a shared future for mankind, actively practice genuine multilateralism, unswervingly expand opening up in an all-around way, and make economic globalization more open, inclusive, balanced and beneficial to all.

Going forward, we will unswervingly implement the decisions and arrangements of the CPC Central Committee, focus on clearing the national economic circulation, and firmly implement the strategy of expanding domestic demand, continue to deepen reform to break and remove institutional barriers, accelerate the establishment of a new open economic system at a higher level, and promote smooth connectivity between domestic and international circulations. Thank you.

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