A leap forward to world market from world plant

Just a few years ago, when people talked about the Chinese mainland, they associate the place with a world plant which churned out product for mid and low market, as well as its exports labeled Made in China. However, things have changed.

China's national income has increased by 9 percent annually since the country adopted reform and opening-up policy more than 20 years ago. Its GDP per capita in 2003 amounted to 1090 USD. A middle class with a population of 50 million plus has been created and people's purchasing power and brand preference have been spiraling up. all of this has resulted in upgrading of the structure of China's social consumption. Experts predict that by 2010 there would be 100 million well-off families with strong purchasing power in this country.

In 2004, bank deposits of Chinese residents which had been rising in the past decade had declined significantly. The massive domestic demand has been boosted which in turn has boosted the economy. Consumption of housing and autos is contributing more to the economic growth. China is successful in transferring into a economy driven by the domestic demand. And this is what a country as developed as Japan has failed.

Japan had been endowed with the opportunity of switching to a economy powered by domestic demand, but it missed the chance while China turned it into a miracle. China's economy is more open than Japan's in many aspects. The openness has brought three advantages to the country.

First, China's economy is able to develop in a flexible way. Second, the economy keeps attractive to international investors. Third, resources allocation is optimized and the function of the government is improved.

Chinese products of good quality and reasonable prices are very popular among global consumers. The neighboring countries find Chinese cuisine taste delicious. The investment environment getting better every day is winning favor of more multinationals. Chinese companies are "going out". The fast growth of China's foreign trade is an driving force of the global trade. The ever increasing imports of China is creating a large number of job opportunities for the world.

There is no doubt that China is growing to be a market for the whole world where multinational, international capital and international brands are competing. Foreign companies which used to regard China as nothing but a world plant is reviewing their China strategy. The further opening-up, development and prosperity of the Chinese economy does and will benefit not only the people in the country, but also the people in the world.

In the new economic map, China has become a powerhouse of the world economy, said Mr. Rubens Ricupero, Secretary-General of UN Conference on Trade and Development a few days ago at a forum in Beijing. His view was evidenced by figures released by Chinese Minister of Commerce, Mr. Bo Xilai, in his speech at the same forum. Bo declared that in the past 25 years, his country's economy grew at a pace about 6 percent faster than the world and its imports increased by 15 percent annually. As the third largest importer in the world following US and Germany, its imports, he predicted, would reach 500 billion USD this year and 1 trillion by 2010.

However, it is also true that China is still a developing nation and faces a wide gap between it and developed countries. Its GDP last year, ranking the one hundred and eleventh in the world, was only one-thirty-fifth of that of US, one-thirty-third of that of Japan, and one-eleventh of that of South Korea. There is still a long way to go before a comprehensive well-off society is there.

By People's Daily Online