Dear Friends,
It is my great pleasure to meet all of you here. Many thank to Invest NI and CBBC for inviting me. On the occasion of Chinese New Year, the Year of Monkey, I would like to extend my best wishes to you all, wish you a good heath, a prosperous business and a happy family.
I believe China Masterclass Programme will help you know more about China and doing business with China. I have no business background but glad to share my views on China's economy and my expectation on China-UK as well as China-NI relations.
The first part: is about my views on China's economic growth
In 2015, China's GDP growth rate is 6.9%, the lowest in recent 25 years. So there is lots of concerns outside about China's economy going and its possible spillover effects to the rest of the world. I have to say the worries are understandable but unnecessary, China will be able to maintain a medium-high growth in the coming years. My optimism is based on the following:
Firstly, China's growth rate is still proper and reasonable given the huge GDP basis. The growth is based on 10 trillion dollars and only the increment is around 500 billion dollars, equal to the year-round GDP of a medium-size economy. China's economic performance is still outstanding among the world major economies.
Secondly, China remained one of the strong engines for world economic growth. Last year, China's import and export totaled 1.68 trillion US dollars, overseas investment amounted to 127.6 billion US dollars, outbound tourists reached 120 million, a increase of 12%. According to IMF, China's contribution to the global economic growth was over 25%.
Thirdly, the quality of economy has been greatly improved. Last year, the service industry accounted to 50.5%of GDP. The final consumption contributed over 66% to the economic growth. The added value of high-tech industry increased by 10.2% , much faster than traditional industry. Online retail saw the growth of more than 30%.
Forthly, the industries are more energy-efficient, environment-friendly. Last year, china's New-energy automobiles increased by 1.6 times. The consumption of non-fossil energy rose to 12% and the energy- consumption per GDP declined by 5.6%.
Fifthly, The regional development is more balanced and coordinated.
In recent years, great efforts has been made to narrow the developing gaps between East and west as well as other regions. Following the initiatives of the Rise of the Midwest China, the Reconstruction of Northeast Old Industrial Base, China has just launched the initiatives like the Coordinated Development Encompassing Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei Province, and the Yangtze River Economic Belt.
Obvious achievement has been made.The urbanization rate reached 56.1% with 770 million population live in cities and towns. Both the urban and rural income are growing fast and the gap is closing up.
The second part: is about the Prediction on China's future economic priorities.
2016 is the first year of China's 13th Five-Year Plan(from 2016 to 2020). It is the decisive period for China to reach the first 100-year's goal, that is to double China's GDP of 2020 on the basis of 2010.
The Proposal of 13th Five-Year Plan has put forward with the five new development concepts: These are Innovationdevelopment, Balanced development, Green development, Opening-up development and Inclusion development. These five principles are built on the previous efforts but more particular and oriented. These should be China's economic priorities in the next five year and even further. Now the specific measures are being formulated by the Chinese government and are expected to be finalized at National People's Congress early this March.
The innovation has been placed at the top to drive the new development. Last year, through stimulating massive innovation and entrepreneurship, Chinese companies are booming, with 4.43 million companies newly registered, namely 12,000 per day in China.
China will speed up building of more innovation platforms such as national laboratories and implementing strategies as"Made in China 2025"to upgrade the manufacturing to a advanced level.
To be frank, It is really not easy for China to keep the medium -high growth, considering China's difficult economic transition and upgrading as well as the dual-shrinking of world trade and investment. Obviously, China will not adopt quantitative-easing or strong stimulation, but determined to tap and create driving forces by deepening systematic reform, by opening wider to the world.
As you know, China is advancing "One Belt and One Road" initiative, which consists of The Silk Road Economic Belt and the Maritime Road, aiming to improve trade and cooperation with Asean, Central Asian and European countries. UK has already involved the project by joining AIIB as a founding member.
The third part: is about the Expectation on China-UK and China-NI relationship.
As we know, the year of 2015 is regarded as a milestone in the history of China-UK relations. During the "Super State Visit" to the UK by China's President Xi Jinping, the leaders of our two countries outlined the future plan for China-UK relationship. Minister Bell met President Xi at the visit.
They committed to build a global comprehensive strategic partnership for the 21st century and opened the "Golden age" of China-UK relationship. Both sides signed business deals valued at 40 billion pounds, including the breakthrough in fields of nuclear energy, finance, infrastructure, new-energy automobiles, airspace and creative industries and so on.
The year 2016 is the first year to implement the China's 13th Five-Year Plan and the initiative of China-UK Golden age. Now both sides are working hard to reach trade goal of 100 billion US dollars, and to enhance synergy between our respective "three development strategies": that is between China's 13th Five-Year Plan, the Belt and Road Initiative, Made in China 2025 and Britain's National Infrastructure Plan (NIP), UK Industry 2050, the Northern Powerhouse.
From the beginning of this year, our two countries started issuing two-year multiple-entry visas to citizens of both sides, which is really a good news for business cooperation. Prime Minister Cameron is highly expected to do the annual meeting with Chinese Premier and to attend the G20 summit in China this year, and more fruits will be expected.
According to my knowledge, London, as an important global financial center, has been playing a increasing important role regarding internalization of Chinese currency. China and UK share huge cooperative potentials in fields of new-energy, smart city, bio-pharmaceuticals, environmental improvement, technological innovation, e-commerce and reformation of industrial bases and public health etc.
Northern Ireland is an impart region of UK, China is committed to building close relations with NI. Right now the bilateral cooperation is not large yet, but growing rapidly. According to NI statistics, Recent bilateral trade volume is over 1.1 billion pounds, with an yearly increase of about 6%.
Last year has witnessed obvious progress in various areas. For example, Bombardier has been doing well in China and is expanding its business. Hopefully Karro Food Group and Dunbia are to be listed to export pork to China soon. Chinese tourists to Giant's Causeway reached over 30,000, rising fast.
As part of China-UK relations, Northern Ireland would naturally integrate in and benefit from China-UK cooperative-frame as always. The bilaterally focused cooperative areas are based on complementary and mutual-benefit principles, and are greatly encouraged by our two governments. That might mean huge and easy opportunities for companies locating in Northern Ireland and other part of UK.
During my one-year stay, I am deeply impressed with NI's unique advantages, such as low-cost of business and living, high level of education, strong financial supporting and high-tech manufacturing, green food and drink production, growing creative industries and tourism and so on.
China has 1.3 billion population, in the process of economic transition and regional re-balancing, social demand is upgrading and multi-layered. As a common sense, if NI could play full use of the strength and find the right target somewhere in China, it should not be far from success.
In short, I believe, in the context of China-UK Golden Age and China's New Economic Plan, combined with NI regional characteristics, China-NI cooperation would bear broad prospects in the future. The Chinese Consulate-General looks forward to working with you and to promote China-NI win-win cooperation to a new level.
Thank you!