UK Media: The 2020s belong to China

                     UK Media: The 2020s belong to China

 

Screenshot of The Guardian report:

 

Just in the past 2019, China's GDP is expected to be close to 100 trillion Yuan, and the average per capita will reach 10000 US dollars. British media article said that in the past 10 years, China's economic development is the most extraordinary economic transformation story in human history. The past 10 years belong to China, and the next 10 years will be the same.

 

Martin Jacque, a senior researcher at Cambridge University, said in a commentary published in the guardian on December 31, 2019 that China's rise is a rare change that has changed the world in history. In the past 10 years, China has been the main source of global economic growth, not the United States. The author believes that the past 10 years belong to China and the next 10 years will still belong to China.

 

To date, the West still feels it is extremely difficult to accept China's rise, with various attitudes, the article said. Some refuse to admit, disapprove or even utter bad words, while others show respect, appreciation and admiration. At present, the former is still more than the latter.

 

By 2010, China began to influence the world in a new way. Before the financial crisis in the west, China was regarded as the new but very junior kid on the block.

 

The financial crisis has changed all this. Before 2008, the traditional western idea was that China's economy would "collapse" sooner or later. But as it turns out, there is no crisis in China. On the contrary, a financial tsunami has swept the western world, bringing huge consequences to the stability and self-confidence of the West.

 

Over the past decade, China, not the US, has been the main driver of global economic growth. Today, China is still one of the fastest growing economies in the world. Today, China's economy is more than twice the size of that in 2010.

 

This is the most remarkable story of economic transformation in human history in the past 10 years.

 

According to the article, China's rise is one of the few changes that have changed the world in history. Unsurprisingly, the West finds this phenomenon unacceptable. It was not until the past decade that the West began to realize that China's rise would indeed change the world.

 

The story continues. Five years ago, let alone 10 years ago, China was synonymous with “cheap manufacturing”. The western world believes that China will not be able to possess the innovation capability that would be a match to the western counterparts for a long time.

 

However, China has proved that it can have strong innovation ability. Shenzhen has become a competitor for the Silicon Valley. Huawei, Tencent and Alibaba can keep pace with Microsoft, Google, Facebook and Amazon. China is also increasingly involved in breakthrough innovation, with patent applications last year accounting for almost half of the world’s total.

 

The author thought that “why should we be surprised?” in a country that has grown by 10% every year for 35 years and by 6% to 8% in the past 10 years, people here are used to rapid change and constant innovation. Don’t forget that Chinese civilization is full of wisdom and has always been committed to learning and education.

 

On October 16, 2019, the first phase of Nairobi Malaba standard gauge railway project in Kenya contracted by Chinese enterprises was officially completed and opened to traffic.

 

The most striking example of China’s growing influence is also reflected in the Belt and Road initiative launched in 2013. At present, China has signed agreements with 137 countries and 30 international organizations, most of which are developing countries.

 

While the current western led international system enters into its declining phase, the Belt and Road initiative can be seen as the sprout of the new order, not literally, but symbolically. Firstly, developing countries dominate the initiative, accounting for 85% of the world’s population; secondly, development is the top priority, which is very important for developing countries, but rarely mentioned in the Western dominated agenda.

 

Finally, the author concludes that in the next 10 years, the international system centered on the West will continue to decompose, and China led institutional influence will increase day by day. The process will be unbalanced - but it will come.