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As is customary on the occasion of any anniversary, we take stock of the past to assess the results achieved and charting the future.
The 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China offers an excellent case study because of its remarkable achievements and the solutions it offers to global challenges.
It all started in 1949 when the People’s Republic of China was founded. At the time, the Chinese people were facing a devastated country that needed to be rebuilt from scratch.
The average life expectancy was 35 years, and the average per capita income was 16 US dollars. The most pressing challenge was to get half a billion Chinese enough food.
As an agricultural country, China’s initial development had long been constrained by its practically negligible industrial capacity.
After decades of collective endeavours and resolute action, China had eventually grown in the 1970s into an “initially industrialised and modernised country”.
In 1978, China started the reform and opening-up process and in the following 40 years has recorded an annual growth of 9.5%, doubling its economy almost every eight years.
In 2010, China overtook Japan as the world’s second economy and in 2015 launched another nation-wide campaign to eradicate poverty in the country by 2020.
The success of this process has been recognised by President Xi Jinping, who at the 2018 G20 summit in Argentina said: “China owes its progress to reform and opening-up and will continue to advance on this path”.
Coming now to the multi-faceted contribution of China to the world, we should mention, inter alia, the following: for years, China has contributed nearly 30% to the world’s economic growth and remained the world’s largest trading nation, the largest exporter and the second-largest importer.
As one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, China has been playing a constructive role in leading efforts to cope with common challenges facing the world.
According to statistics, China has dispatched 40,000 peacekeepers to some 30 UN peacekeeping operations since 1990, the most among all five permanent UN Security Council members. It is also the second-largest donor country to UN peacekeeping missions.
To help address climate change, China has been stepping up its efforts in pushing forward green development and implementing the Paris Agreement on Climate Change as part of its development guidelines.
In June 2018, within the framework of China’s diplomatic initiative, President Xi put forward his Thought on Diplomacy (guideline for China's diplomatic work), one of the most major advances in foreign diplomacy theory since the founding of the People’s Republic of China.
In this new context of diplomatic work, China is aiming at calmly responding to the complex and profound changes in the international situation, firmly safeguarding national interests, deepening friendly cooperation and actively assuming the role of a responsible major country.
To that end, reference should be made to the progress achieved in building major-country relations.
This covers mainly the China-US relationship, which at present is facing a negative trend because of the trade war, the China-Russia strategic collaborative partnership and the China-European Union cooperation, which forged closer bonds of interest.
Breakthroughs are also registered in China’s neighbourhood diplomacy. Within this framework, mention should be made, inter alia, of the first unofficial meeting between Chinese and Indian leaders, the China-Japan relations, which are back on track, the China-DPRK frequent meetings which gave vitality to their traditional relationship, and the China-South Korea relations which took a positive new look, while the traditional cooperation of China, Japan and South Korea resumed positive momentum.
Another field of foreign affairs activities is what is known as “South-South cooperation”.
The mechanisms for collective dialogue with most of these countries cover, inter alia, Arab, Middle Eastern, African, Latin American and Pacific island countries.
Being a beneficiary of a world characterised by global partnership and multilateralism, China knows well that only by cooperating with others and opening up to the world can a country obtain inexhaustible power to go forward.
The concept of building a community with a shared future for mankind was for the first time put forward by China, setting the course for the future development of mankind.
Transforming the vision into reality, China promoted the Belt and Road Initiative, to improving connectivity and cooperation on a transcontinental scale.
By April 2019, 125 countries and 29 international organisations had signed the relevant cooperation documents with China.
As the managing director of the IMF, Christine Lagarde observed, China, after it has constructed a “bridge to the world” by opening its economy and starting reforms 40 years ago, is now building a “bridge to prosperity…. and also, a bridge to the future”.
Concluding, we can state without hesitation that today’s China is moving closer to the world’s centre stage.
After stunning achievements over the past 70 years, China has learned that global partnership and multilateralism are the optimal solutions for mankind.
Through deep integration into world affairs, China has also left its profound impact on many global challenges providing solutions with Chinese characteristics.
We, therefore, offer on this 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China our warmest congratulations and best wishes for further successes in the years to come.
