Digital economy becomes new driving force for China's steady growth

The digital economy, driven by technologies including the Internet of Things (IoT), big data and cloud computing, has gradually become a new driving force for China's steady growth.

A visitor displays a cup of coffee purchased with China's digital yuan, or the e-CNY, at an exhibition of the 6th Digital China Summit in Fuzhou, southeast China's Fujian Province, April 26, 2023. (Xinhua/Wei Peiquan)

The scale of China's digital economy reached 50.2 trillion yuan ($7.26 trillion) in 2022, and the share of the digital economy in the country's GDP rose to 41.5 percent, according to data released at the 6th Digital China Summit held in Fuzhou, capital of southeast China's Fujian Province, from April 27 to 28.

China has built the largest and technologically advanced network infrastructure in the world and become the world's largest online retail market. The scale of the core industries of the country's industrial internet has exceeded 1.2 trillion yuan. New business forms related to digitalization have emerged in the country.

An increasing number of traditional manufacturers in China have started embracing digitalization. Statistics from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology showed that China has built over 2,100 high-level digital workshops and smart factories. In particular, 209 demonstration factories, after going through an intelligent transformation, have shortened the R&D cycle by 20.7 percent, improved production efficiency by 34.8 percent, lowered the defect rate by 27.4 percent and reduced carbon emissions by 21.2 percent.

At Sanmenxia Shentong Carbon Co., Ltd. , a traditional chemical enterprise that produces pre-baked carbon anodes for aluminum electrolysis in Sanmenxia city, central China's Henan Province, general manager Zhang Weiguo was staring at a big screen at the company's smart center to check on the production. The sales revenue of the company in the first quarter of this year hit 194 million yuan.

Before the intelligent transformation of production techniques, the company's production process was characterized by high energy consumption, heavy pollution, and low production efficiency and profit margins.

"In the past, our company halted production more than four months every year to meet environmental protection requirements," said Zhang.

To address the problem, the company sought intelligent manufacturing solutions. It upgraded outdated manufacturing equipment and built a 5G-based smart factory with an intelligent management platform that can monitor environmental protection, contain fires, inspect and monitor energy consumption.

The application of 5G-powered industrial monitoring equipment has ensured the safe production and efficient environmental monitoring while reducing labor and energy costs, according to Zhang.

"Take the use of natural gas alone for example. The company can save 560,000 yuan worth of natural gas and 50,000 yuan in labor costs per month," Zhang said. The precise control of the calcination temperature has directly improved production efficiency and product quality, greatly enhancing the market competitiveness of the company's products.

Smart retailing has also become a new way of shopping in China. Smart retailing usually refers to a retail pattern that uses internet and IoT technologies to identify consumption habits and predict consumption trends for the purpose of guiding production and provide diversified and personalized products and services for consumers. Smart retailing is becoming popular across China.

Placing orders through mini programs, unmanned supermarkets, “trying on” clothes with the help of virtual reality (VR) devices, and livestreaming e-commerce all fall into smart retailing application scenarios.

Providing services that cover online and offline shopping scenarios for customers has increasingly become the common understanding of brick-and-mortar retailers in China.

Meanwhile, China identified 97 professions related to digital sectors, including digitalization managers, robot engineering technicians, digital solution designers, and agricultural digitalization technicians in September 2022, providing new possibilities to create jobs.

The emergence of new professions and jobs is related to the industrial development of the digital economy, said Zhuo Xian, deputy head of the department of development strategy and regional economy at the Development Research Center of the State Council.

It was reported that nearly 200 million people in China are engaged in the digital economy, which account for a quarter of the country's total employed population.

Talents are crucial to the digital economy. They hold the key to developing the digital industry and transforming traditional industries with digital technologies, said Li Jinsheng, an official at the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security.

Multiple regions across China have explored ways to cultivate digital talent. North China's Hebei Province issued an implementation plan for the cultivation of technicians and skilled workers related to the digital economy by focusing on new professions such as intelligent manufacturing technicians, blockchain technicians, and big data technicians. East China's Jiangsu Province formulated a development plan for digital economy talents to train 1,000 outstanding engineers in the digital economy every year.