Explainer | From outer space to seven seas, China has 6 ambitious priorities as Beijing plots economic recovery in 2024

China’s annual tone-setting central economic work conference concluded on Tuesday, with a 4,355-character outline of leadership’s plans for next year
Commercial space flights, the silver economy, competitive domestic brands, food security and a pragmatic work style are all getting a closer look in China

China's economic recovery

Frank Chenin Shanghai

Published: 8:30pm, 13 Dec 2023

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China’s annual two-day central economic work conference, which concluded on Tuesday, laid down expansive policy priorities for the world’s second-largest economy to carve out a stronger recovery path in 2024.

From boosting business sentiment to better coordination among ministries, the 4,355-character readout of the meeting chaired by President Xi Jinping contained a long to-do list.

1. Commercial space flight, hi-tech ambitions

Chinese leaders explicitly stated their ambitions in advancing frontier technologies, including low-attitude aerospace, commercial space flight and quantum science, seeing these realms as new sources of economic growth.

The comments came after China’s space authorities said this month that the success of Elon Musk’s SpaceX posed an “unprecedented challenge”.

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“China has made progress in related research and development, but it’s a different story to commercialise research and development outcomes and develop products that meet the needs of businesses and people,” said Wu Xinjian, a manager at a Shanghai-based incubator and tech consultancy.

2. Become a powerful marine country

The readout also contained Beijing’s imperative to bolster the development of China’s marine economy and be an oceanic superpower, but it did not elaborate on how such an undertaking would be achieved.

China has grown the size of its marine economy to 7.2 trillion yuan (US$1 trillion) in the first three quarters of 2023, up 5.8 per cent from a year earlier, government data showed.

Currently, long-running discordance in the South China Sea and other territorial disputes are complicating Beijing’s ambitious plans to bolster its blue economy.

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3. Silver economy

The central economic work conference statement specifically mentioned the “silver economy”, with leaders seeking to turn demographic challenges into an opportunity to shore up the economy.

Unlike last year, when the authorities vowed to counter ageing and the falling childbirths, Beijing now says it wants high-quality development. Leaders have previously stressed that China’s talent pool is booming, while playing down the disappearance of the nation’s demographic dividend that powered decades of rapid economic growth.

Justin Lin, a prominent economics professor at Peking University and a veteran government adviser, said last month that his findings indicate the demographic shift is an opportunity to boost efficiency, productivity and consumption demand.

China had 209.78 million aged 65 or older last year, accounting for 14.9 per cent of the population.

4. More sales of home-grown brands

Beijing listed guohuo, or new and competitive domestic brands, as new growth points for next year when it hopes the spending power of the 1.4 billion people can carry the economy forward.

Many domestic players can already offer cost-effective products while geopolitical tensions add patriotic cachet to buying them.

In electric vehicles and consumer goods segments, the “made in China” label is being associated with not only patriotism but also with good quality and a design that suits the needs of Chinese customers.

5. Food security

There was much more content in the central economic work conference statement on agriculture and food security than in readouts from previous years.

Specifically, Beijing vowed to secure the supply of grain and other staple foods, stabilise the size of arable land, and invest more in farmland preservation and construction.

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China’s emphasis on food security has enabled it to largely offset the impact of the El Nino weather phenomenon this year, with annual grain output up 1.3 per cent, year on year, to almost 700 million tonnes in 2023.

“Beijing increasingly sees it as a key safeguard for the economy, sending the message that protecting farmlands and growing crops are part of the economy,” said Alex Ma, a Peking University professor in public administration.

6. More pragmatic work style

Beijing added a new work principle of establishing the new before abolishing the old, meaning they will not rush to abolish something, such as property policies, and would avoid certain types of campaigns to achieve policy goals.

Campaigns to save energy, reduce carbon emissions and crack down on the nation’s private-tutoring sector have backfired or invited new problems in recent years.

Chinese leaders are also putting more emphasis on managing market expectations.

They requested a new approach to balance macro data and macro-management with how ordinary grass-roots people may feel and think, prepare an ample “policy reserve” in advance, and leave room for adjustments and manoeuvring. And they say policy appraisals should focus on effectiveness, or implementations.