BEIJING, Feb. 2 (Xinhua) -- China's strategic emerging industries are flourishing as the country advances economic transformation and upgrading, injecting new impetus to high-quality development.

The country's gross domestic product (GDP) grew to 99.09 trillion yuan (14.38 trillion U.S. dollars) last year, with the per capita GDP topping 10,000 U.S. dollars, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

China's economy has moved from high-speed growth into a stage of high-quality development, said Ning Jizhe, head of the NBS.

In 2019, value-added industrial output expanded 5.7 percent year on year, with the production in high-tech manufacturing industries and strategic emerging industries increasing by 8.8 percent and 8.4 percent.

As the strategic emerging industries, high-tech manufacturing industries and modern services expand in the economy, China's economic structure is keeping optimized, with strengthened quality and resilience, noted Liu Zhe, a researcher with the think tank WANB Institute.

INNOVATION DRIVES INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT

In November 2019, mobile phone shipments reached 34.84 million units, while 5G phone shipments stood at 5.07 million units, for the first time exceeding 5 million units in a month, data from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT) showed.

5G mobile phones are just a glimpse into the huge industrial opportunities brought by new technologies. China's total 5G investment scale will reach about 900 billion yuan in 2020, and 5G is predicted to create 6.3 trillion yuan of direct economy production in 2030, according to the report on China's 5G economy of 2020 from the CAICT.

Emerging key information technology such as 5G is becoming the core engine for digital economy as well as an important factor in implementing the supply-side reform, ensuring China's front position in the new round of scientific and technological revolution, said Yuan Leifeng, an official with the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council.

In eastern China's Jiangxi Province, the application of virtual reality (VR) technology is speeding up.

A skilled welder is able to pound 4,000 to 5,000 nails a day. However, a robot with VR technology pound 25,000 in the same amount of time, with higher quality work and only costing one-eighth that of using a skilled welder, said Yang Wen, a company representative from the Jianglian Heavy Industry Group Co., Ltd.

It is necessary to have the awareness and actions of industrial application at the beginning of scientific research, noted Yuan Hongyong, executive dean of the Hefei Institute for Public Safety Research of Tsinghua University.

REGIONAL PROGRESS

China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) has released the first list of 66 strategic emerging industries clusters in 2019, including 30 clusters from the country's central and western provinces.

The revenue of the listed companies of strategic emerging industries in central China and western China increased by 9.6 percent and 12.2 percent, respectively, in the first three quarters of 2019, higher than the growth rates of the ones in eastern and northeast China, showing a narrowed gap across different regions, said Liu Yunan, head of the State Information Center.

The Yangtze River Economic Belt will cultivate a series of world-level enterprises and industrial clusters in 2020 to achieve significant improvement in the quality and efficiency of the economic development, according to the guideline of the development plan for the Yangtze River Economic Belt.

As one of the sub-centers of Shanghai, Xuhui district saw an economic production of 29.2 billion yuan from artificial intelligence (AI) and its related industries in 2019, up 30.8 percent year on year.

Microsoft Research Labs, Huawei's Kunpeng Industrial Ecosystem Innovation Center and SenseTime's Chinese headquarters and global research and development headquarters were all established in Xuhui district, as the AI industrial cluster of the district was shortlisted in the NDRC's first list.

Xuhui district will build up a collaborative innovation platform and enhance its attractiveness to the domestic and international innovation resources for its innovation-driven development model, said Bao Bingzhang, secretary of the Communist Party of China Xuhui District Committee.