China's efforts to achieve modernization benefit world: experts

GUANGZHOU, April 19 (Xinhua) -- China's efforts to achieve modernization will effectively boost the world's development and offer a new model of growth for developing countries, experts said at the ongoing Understanding China conference.

The conference has brought together officials, experts, entrepreneurs, foreign envoys and representatives of international organizations and multinational companies. It aims to help people understand China's modernization and the opportunities it will bring to the world.

In a video speech, former Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo hailed China's development achievements since the beginning of reform and opening-up as "breathtaking."

Arroyo said China has proven to be a partner in development rather than a competitor. It is also a market for developing countries, a donor and a provider of capital and technology.

She added that by recognizing the value of infrastructure and technology with strong will and long-term vision, China is setting a new growth model in the increasing complexity and acceleration of change in the entire world system.

"The world is indeed in a new era, and this new era calls for a new journey and new cooperation," she said.

David Ferguson, honorary chief English editor of Foreign Languages Press, said that the modernization of many Western countries was usually based on the exploitation of the working classes, other countries and the environment, which is an outdated model that China clearly cannot follow.

Chinese modernization, said Ferguson, is based on a set of structures, processes and actions properly suited to the modern world, which can be summarized as cooperation, consultation and consensus.

Huang Ping, director of the Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao research center under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that Chinese modernization brings about high-quality social-economic development, which is supported by a set of social governance systems with Chinese characteristics, as well as ideas and concepts that promote cultural exchange and draw on the strengths of various perspectives.

"Chinese modernization stresses pluralism and unity in diversity," said Huang. "Building a community with a shared future for humankind involves promoting a governance system that values diversity at the global level."

Jusuf Wanandi, Vice Chairman of the Board of Trustees at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies Foundation in Jakarta, Indonesia, said an important takeaway from the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China last year was the proposal of advancing the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation on all fronts through a Chinese path to modernization.

"This is highly significant, because it represents more than just a goal for China's development in the new era," said Wanandi. "It clearly points out the path that China chooses to take towards modernization and national rejuvenation."

With China now traveling on the path of Chinese modernization, Southeast Asian countries are watching closely and looking forward to cooperating with China, Wanandi added.