18.09.2023
Ren Ping
Economic globalization unites the world economy, strengthening the interdependence of countries. Not a single state can achieve modernization by relying only on itself and isolating itself from the outside world. Strengthening interconnectedness and interaction is necessary for joint development. The Belt and Road Initiative, Rooted in History of the Great Silk Road. It follows the spirit of the Silk Road – peace, cooperation, openness, mutual learning and borrowing, mutual benefit and win-win partnership, and has been open and inclusive since its inception.
The ten-year joint construction of the Belt and Road has markedly strengthened the interconnectedness between countries and regions along the route, allowing them to better integrate into global production chains, global supply chains and value chains, and opening up greater opportunities for their development. In particular, on Indochine peninsula, the China-Laos Railway gave Laos, an inland country, access to the sea, which greatly simplified the movement of local residents and boosted the economy of areas along the line; in Kazakhstan, thanks to the modernization of the oil refinery in Shymkent city, emissions of pollutants were reduced by 90% and many technical specialists were trained; Kenya’s Mombasa-Nairobi railway gave impetus to the economic growth on two interest points.
As part of the Belt and Road Initiative, agreements have already been signed to implement more than 3,000 cooperation projects totaling approximately $1 trillion and many national landmarks, public infrastructure facilities and “monuments” to cooperation have been built. The joint construction of “One Belt, One Road” has opened up a new model of interaction on a mutually beneficial basis and has become an extremely popular public good and an important platform international cooperation. The initiative benefits people around the world.
Openness – the most important engine of progress of human civilization and the right path to world prosperity. Today the world is experiencing profound, accelerating changes, and recovery world economy remains weak. No country can overcome the challenges of global economic development alone. As Chinese President Xi Jinping noted, integration leads to economic progress, and isolation leads to its regression. Only by firmly developing an open world economy, sharing opportunities and benefits through greater openness and achieving mutual benefit, will the world’s countries be able to lead the world economy out of crisis and onto the path of inclusive growth and shared prosperity.
Through the creation of open cooperation platforms, One Belt, One Road promotes the formation of a fair, rational and a transparent system of rules for international trade and investment. The initiative also promotes the orderly movement of factors of production, efficient allocation of resources and deeper integration of markets. This creates a favorable environment for open development, maintains and develops an open world economy, and steadily advances economic globalization, allowing different countries to benefit mutually and achieve common prosperity and sustainable development.
Openness is the hallmark of modern China. Chinese modernization is consistently moving forward in the process of expanding openness to the outside world and fruitful interaction with other states. Countries participating in the “One Belt, One Road” initiative adhere to the principles joint consultations, consultations construction and joint use of the results, defend true multilateralism, solve common problems by consultations, consultations fully revealing your strengths, advantages and potential.
Visible results have been achieved over the past decade, demonstrating China’s practical action and strong determination to share its market opportunities with the world and actively promote an open global economy. This clearly confirms that the construction of the “One Belt, One Road” is not China alone, but a choir of countries along the route. It is also the “broad highway” along which China and the world share opportunities and build a common future. Subject to the principles of dialogue, consultation, joint construction, joint using results, mutually beneficial cooperation, sharing experiences, borrowing and searching for the “highest common denominator”, this path of openness will only expand, covering more and more regions.
In the city of Quanzhou (Fujian Province, Southeast China), where the maritime Silk Road began in ancient times, various decorations in the Kaiyuan Temple, including a tower in Brahmanism, a column with Hindu ornaments, a foot with an image lion heads and wings of flying apsaras, demonstrate the prosperity of the ancient maritime Silk Road.
The flourishing of civilizations and the progress of mankind are impossible without the search for commonalities while maintaining differences and are inseparable from openness, tolerance, cultural exchange and mutual learning. Today, the implementation of the One Belt, One Road initiative has entered a new phase. Adhering to the principles of joint consultation, joint construction and sharing of results, strengthening interconnectedness and interaction, overcoming development difficulties by expanding openness, joining forces, shaping innovative potential and creating common prosperity, the countries will definitely achieve new successes during the high-quality joint construction of the “One Belt, One Road”. This will open up new space for the growth of the world economy and make a new contribution to improving the well-being of the people of all countries.
Source: “People’s Daily” online http://www.people.com.cn/
