SCIO briefing on promoting high-quality development during 15th Five-Year Plan period

National Business Daily:

The National Development Planning Law was released after this year's NPC and CPPCC sessions, along with the outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan. I would like to ask what impact the implementation of this law will have on the implementation of the plan? Thank you.

Wang Changlin:

I would like to invite Ms. Chen to answer your question.

Chen Lei:

Thank you for your question. General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that adhering to the principle that planning should be legally-based is an important experience of our Party in formulating and implementing five-year plans. Over the years, we have formulated and implemented five-year plans in accordance with the Constitution and relevant laws, and have formed a mature practice in which the CPC Central Committee formulates the recommendations, the State Council compiles the outline, and the National People's Congress reviews and approves them before they are announced to the public for implementation. The national development planning system has also been continuously improved through practice. The National Development Planning Law, reviewed and adopted at the Fourth Session of the 14th National People's Congress, further codifies the aforementioned mature systems into legal norms. This is of great significance for consolidating and expanding the advantages of formulating and implementing five-year plans under the centralized and unified leadership of the CPC Central Committee. I would like to elaborate on this from three aspects.

First, it further ensures that the role of national development plans as a strategic guide will be fully leveraged. The rule of law plays the role in establishing a solid fundamental, stabilizing expectations and ensuring long-term benefits. The National Development Planning Law stipulates that national development planning is a phased deployment and arrangement of the socialist modernization strategy within the planning period. The Outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan aims to basically realize socialist modernization by 2035, and sets forth the goals and directions for promoting new industrialization, agricultural and rural modernization, urbanization, and digital and intelligent development during the 15th Five-Year Plan period. It clarifies the goal of maintaining GDP growth within a reasonable range on the basis of structural optimization and quality improvement, laying a solid foundation for doubling per capita GDP from the 2020 level and reaching the level of moderately developed countries by 2035. At the same time, it outlines a series of goals and tasks focusing on improving people's livelihoods and promoting green and low-carbon transformation. This fully demonstrates our firm strategic direction of adhering to high-quality development and consistently advancing Chinese modernization, providing long-term stable expectations for the development of China and even the world.

Second, it further highlights the unique advantages of formulating and implementing five-year plans under the socialist market economy. The National Development Planning Law emphasizes the need to comprehensively deepen reforms and build a high-standard socialist market economy. The Outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan takes the synergy between an efficient market and a well-functioning government as a principle that must be followed. It launches a number of reform and opening up measures and policy arrangements in a coordinated manner, focusing on advancing reforms for the market-based allocation of production factors, advancing the construction of a unified national market, and creating a first-rate business environment that is market-oriented, law-based and internationalized, with the goal of creating an economic order defined by both market vitality and effective regulation. This fully demonstrates that national development planning can give full play to the decisive role of the market in allocating resources, while also better leveraging the role of the government, thus injecting strong momentum and vitality into the long-term sustainable development of the economy and society.

Third, it further consolidates the efforts of all parties to participate in the implementation of national development planning. The National Development Planning Law clearly states that the state will construct a planning system comprising both national and local plans, with the national development plan as the guide, territorial spatial planning as the foundation, and special plans and regional plans as support. It will strengthen macro-policy coordination and work synergy to provide systematic support for the implementation of the plan. During the implementation of the 15th Five-Year Plan, the tasks laid out in the outline in key areas and regions will be advanced through special plans and regional planning implementation schemes, ensuring the rolling implementation of annual plans and the coordinated support of policy resources. This will help to fully mobilize the enthusiasm, initiative and creativity of all parties, and form a working pattern for plan implementation that features coordinated collaboration and broad participation.

We will promptly release information about the progress of the plan's implementation to the public in an appropriate manner and accept supervision from all sectors of society. I hope to work with all of you to better promote the effective implementation of the 15th Five-Year Plan within the framework of the rule of law. Thank you.