East China's Jiangxi strives for high-quality development

Provincial officials of east China's Jiangxi Province attend a press briefing on continuing Jiangxi's revolutionary glories, striving ahead in promoting high-quality development of its old revolutionary base areas, in Beijing, capital of China, May 16, 2024.(Xinhua/Li He)

BEIJING, May 16 (Xinhua) -- East China's Jiangxi Province, an old revolutionary base in China, pledged more efforts to promote high-quality development on Thursday.

Ye Jianchun, governor of Jiangxi Province, told a press briefing in Beijing on Thursday that Jiangxi witnessed a significant improvement in its comprehensive economic development, with its gross domestic product (GDP) increasing from 1.28 trillion yuan (about 177.4 billion U.S. dollars) in 2012 to 3.22 trillion yuan in 2023.

Jiangxi has entered the ranks of emerging industrial provinces from a traditional agricultural province. In 2023, Jiangxi's industrial added value reached 1.12 trillion yuan, and the proportion of manufacturing added value in GDP remained at about 33 percent, ranking among the top in the country.

Furthermore, Jiangxi has always kept a leading role in environmental quality, with a forest coverage rate at more than 63.1 percent, ranking second in the country. Its proportion of days with good air in 2023 was 96.5 percent.

To promote high-quality development, Jiangxi will implement in-depth actions to upgrade key industrial chains in the manufacturing industry. The province will strengthen 12 key manufacturing industry chains, such as electronic information, non-ferrous metals and equipment manufacturing, and build six advanced manufacturing clusters such as lithium battery and photovoltaic new energy.

Jiangxi also aims to speed up the development of green and ecological industries. It holds a bottom line that in the process of promoting economic development, it will never sacrifice the environment to achieve temporary growth, and will never trade pollution for GDP.

In the process of transformation and upgrading of traditional industries, Jiangxi will adhere to a high-end, intelligent and green path, and vigorously develop industries such as ecological agriculture, ecological cultural tourism, and ecological health care.

Measures will be also be taken to effectively promote the province's comprehensive rural revitalization, better serve the high-quality development of the Yangtze Economic Belt by ecological environment protection and green transformation and promote the rise of central China.