The Third Plenum of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) was held from July 15 to July 18 in Beijing. At this important event, new circumstances and challenges were fully assessed and a grand strategy to further deepen reform and open up have been formulated and approved. The Plenum has offered a window for the rest of the world to understand China’s pursuit of high-quality development and high-level open-up in the new era. The Resolution passed by the Plenum spells out specific plans to upgrade and renovate in all critical areas. Reform and opening up have been China’s unwavering national policy over the past 40-plus years.
If only one sentence can be used to sum up the guiding principles of this meeting, it is “continuation of reform and opening up.” The Third Plenum of the 11th CPC Central Committee held in the late 1970s marked a turning point in China's contemporary history. It was at this event when reform and opening up was adopted for the first time as national policy. Since then, China has embarked on a new trajectory and created a miracle of long-term social stability and sustainable economic growth, becoming the second-largest economy in the world. Now, China has succeeded in alleviating poverty and achieving a goal of building a moderately prosperous society, as scheduled.
It is fair to say that for China, reform and opening up are key to its success, and it has become the national policy that China has long adhered to. Despite fast-changing international and domestic circumstances, we believe that only by reforming and opening up can China - in a timely manner - optimize our organizational structure and meet the demands of the people and society. Recently, we have prioritized fostering quality productivity, leveraging scientific and technological innovation, to turbocharge economic productivity - more bang for the buck.
Meanwhile, we spare no efforts in expanding opening up, because we are fully aware that isolation is doomed to a deadend and deglobalization is not in-line with the trends of the times. At present, some countries choose to isolate themselves from the rest of the world out of their own selfish interests with approaches like "small yard, high fence" and “decoupling” - a rock that will fall on their feet.
The Chinese modernization has five distinctive features: huge population, common prosperity for all, material and cultural-ethical advancement, harmony between humanity and nature, and peaceful development. The overall goal of the Plenum is to improve system of socialism with Chinese characteristics and modernize China’s system and capacity for governance, which identifies seven key areas: building a high-standard socialist market economy, advancing whole-process people’s democracy, developing a strong socialist culture in China, improving people’s quality of life, building a beautiful green China, advancing the Secure China project, and improving the Party’s capacity for leadership and governance. In order to achieve the above goals, the Resolution puts forward more than 300 specific measures and plans to complete all tasks by 2029.
What I want to stress is that China's national policies have been coherent and consistent. Many of the reform measures introduced at this session touch upon institutional mechanisms - some of which are upgraded from past measures and some of which are new ones initiated to meet new demands following pilot tests. Coherence and consistency are critical to the implementation of a major policy. What we are doing is unlike any other country, whence a new administration comes to power, they make unpredictable policy changes, making other countries at a loss as to what to do next.
For the moment, the international situation is volatile and complex, and uncertainties looming, but this will not affect China's determination and confidence in deepening reforms and expanding opening up. In the Resolution, we will continue to expand institutional opening up by promoting foreign trade, FDI, and overseas investment. High-quality Belt and Road cooperation becomes one of the priorities. In an aim to open up wider and deeper, China would leverage a super-size domestic market with its buying power and tech savviness to create favorable conditions for robust economic growth.
Meanwhile, the Resolution offers opportunities for foreign capital to access Chinese markets. The Service sector would open further, the Special Administrative Measures for Foreign Investment Access (Negative List) for cross-border trade in services would be promulgated soon, and restrictions on foreign investments in areas like telecommunication, internet, education, culture, and healthcare would be loosened in an orderly manner. Many steps would be taken to facilitate foreign businessmen and tourists regarding their accommodations, medical care, digital payments, etcetera.
It is not enough to formulate good policies. The key to success lies in the effective implementation of them. Planning only contributes ten percent to the success of an undertaking, while ninety percent rely on implementation. The Resolution puts forward some guiding principles on how to implement those measures: A full and comprehensive understanding of the importance and significance of reform and opening up is a primary requirement; A meticulous plan for implementation is needed; Accountability should be delivered from top to bottom at all levels - supervision and oversight must be followed up; All tasks could not be done overnight, long-term arduous efforts are needed. As we deepen reform, we must be fully aware of its complexity and difficulty ahead and take resolute actions and deliver tangible results. We must keep moving forward until our goal is met.
China's political system has a strong organizational advantage. We have one blueprint for overall development, and all policies and actions must be compatible with it. It is fair to say that once a goal is set in China, all resources and efforts would be mobilized to that end. It is concluded from past historical experiences that an indispensable key to success in China is the Party's strong leadership
Iraq is an important country in the Middle East, and the Kurdistan Region is located strategically in the north of Iraq. There is great potential for high-quality Belt and Road cooperation between us. For the first half of this year, the bilateral trade between China and Iraq has reached $27.54 billion, an increase of 14.4 percent year-to-year. It is expected that China's exports to Iraq will exceed $16 billion US dollars for the whole year, which will hit a record high. Machinery and equipment (mainly air conditioners) account for 23 percent of total Chinese exports, followed by electronic equipment (mobile phones and televisions etc.) with 13 percent, and automobiles in third place with 6 percent.
China is the KRI’s third-largest trading partner after Turkey and Iran. China’s clean energy industry is growing fast and now far ahead of other countries - famous for high-tech products like solar panels, batteries, EVs, etc. It is our hope that those quality products from China would have access to local markets for the benefit of people.
On top of that, much potential should be tapped for cooperation in areas like infrastructure, agriculture, water conservancy, and green and environmental protection. On capacity-building for human resources, many more people from KRG, governorates, universities, and NGOs have attended training courses in China compared to last year. Since the beginning of this year, the Consulate General has officially launched full consular services, optimized the visa application process and offered convenience to people in the KRI who engage in business with China. Looking into the future, it is our hope that collaboration and cooperation between the two sides would be further promoted so as to help KRI with economic growth and social development.
Mr. Liu Jun is the Consul General of the People’s Republic of China in Erbil.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rudaw.