Technology and innovation help achieve inclusive growth

An industrial robot interacts with a participant of the Dalian Summer Davos Annual Meeting at the Dalian International Conference Center in Dalian, Northeast China's Liaoning province, June 27, 2017. [Photo by Zhu Xingxin/chinadaily.com.cn]

As Premier Li Keqiang remarked in his opening speech at the 11th Annual Meeting of the New Champions on Tuesday, farmers in China's remote mountainous areas can now see their specialty products reach urban consumers in just one or two days, and at prices several times higher than if they were sold locally－all thanks to the booming online trading platforms and express delivery networks that have emerged in recent years.

Li used this as an example to highlight how technology and innovation can accelerate more inclusive economic growth, featuring meaningful job creation and sustainable development, a main theme of the three-day meeting, known as the Summer Davos, which is being held in the coastal city of Dalian, Northeast China's Liaoning province.

Indeed China has a lot to share on how jobs can be created by promoting innovation and entrepreneurship. Over the last four to five years, more than 50 million new jobs, or around 10 million annually, have been created in the country, a remarkable achievement of the government's endeavor to promote mass entrepreneurship and innovation, which, as Li said, has seen 14,000 new enterprises registered each day over the past three years.

By helping foster a rapid development of new industries and business models, such as e-commerce, mobile payments and the building of a sharing economy, technology and innovation are playing a key role in China's bid to upgrade and transition its economy to more sustainable growth. China can share that experience with the political and business leaders from other countries attending the meeting.

The new growth momentum not only created 70 percent of all new jobs in the country last year, it also laid a firm foundation for China to realize its growth target of around 6.5 percent for the year.

Such robust economic performance is a boon to the world economy that is still suffering from insufficient recovery momentum.

And as Li noted in his speech, the Chinese economy will bring more opportunities to the world and continue to be a magnet for foreign investment as it further opens up.

This, together with his pledge to give foreign and Chinese businesses fair and equal treatment, will surely contribute to global inclusive growth if, as he urged, countries seek convergent interests and complement each other's advantages.