China is stepping up efforts to improve the quality of its products and services, and enhance the influence of its brands, by 2025. According to government officials, the move is expected to give a boost to the country’s industrial competitiveness, driving further economic growth.
The State Council, China’s Cabinet, recently launched a plan that aims to build a solid foundation by 2035, by increasing the comprehensive competitiveness of Chinese products and brands to a higher level. “Enhancing quality is important to driving Chinese-style modernization, promoting a large economy to be stronger and boosting high-quality development of the economy and society,” said Tian Shihong, deputy head of the State Administration for Market Regulation, China’s top market regulator.
The plan put forward eight key tasks and aims to deliver a remarkable improvement in the quality of industrial development, including enterprise management, upgrading the value chain of traditional competitive industries and advancing the services industry.
Additionally, the plan proposes more efforts to improve the upgrading quality of daily life services and to guide the standardized development of emerging personalized services, such as online ride-hailing, online shopping and mobile payments.
Tian said, “Compared with previous plans, the new plan puts more focus on indicators like the expansion of quality-competitive industries and the establishment of a number of quality-excellent industrial clusters.”
The plan is in line with the goals proposed at the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, which emphasized the development of the real economy and promoting new industrialization, including building China into a bigger economy in quality product manufacturing and provider of services.
In the past few years, the quality of major technical equipment, projects, important consumer goods, and high-tech products in emerging fields in China has increased. The qualified product rating of the country’s manufacturing industry has hit over 93% for several years consecutively, according to the State Administration for Market Regulation.
However, according to Zhang Junwei, a researcher of macroeconomic research at the Development Research Center of the State Council, “the quality of some Chinese products and services still lags behind that of those in some other nations, especially in advanced industrial components and technologies.” Thus, the plan comes at an opportune moment to address these problems.
Tian emphasized that the new plan will also expand the level of intellectual property rights protection and reduce the number of low-quality products and fake goods.
The promotion of high-quality products and services is key to China’s economic growth and international competitiveness. By boosting the quality of Chinese products, the country can increase its influence on the global stage, enhance its reputation for innovation and quality, and attract more foreign investment.