Economic Daily:
The uneven development between urban and rural areas and between various regions in Guangzhou has always been a challenge for the province. Last year, General Secretary Xi Jinping made requirements for Guangdong during his visit to the province. To address the challenge, what measures have been taken and how do they work? Thank you.
Ma Xingrui:
Thank you for your question. The most daunting challenges facing Guangdong are the uneven development between regions and the urban-rural dual structure. Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, General Secretary Xi Jinping has set very clear requirements for Guangdong's integrated development for multiple times. Especially during his visit from Oct. 22 to 25 last year, Xi asked us to take efforts to resolve the urban-rural dual structure, narrow the gap between the Pearl River Delta and the region of south Guangdong, west Guangdong and north Guangdong, and push for balanced and coordinated development. Those three areas occupy 70% of the land in the province, but account for only 20% of the provincial GDP, while the remaining 80% goes to the Pearl River Delta. Uneven development has been a longstanding issue. Guangdong still has a huge gap between urban and rural areas, as the ratio of rural income to urban income stands at 1:2.58. As a result, we will work hard to resolve the two issues.
Regional coordinated development means further focusing on relative strategies. The provincial government designed the new development pattern of "One Core, One Belt and One Region," —the Pearl River Delta as "One Core," the coastal economic belt as "One Belt," and the ecological development zone in north Guangdong as "One Region." Regional coordinated development also means we will increase support for east Guangdong, west Guangdong and north Guangdong. For example, we will advance the construction of the high-speed transit connecting the Pearl River Delta with the three parts of Guangdong, as well as a high-speed railway. We will also facilitate the construction of airports in Zhanjiang, Jieyang and Shaoguan. We are funneling more S&T resources to those three areas of Guangdong, and supporting their development of basic public services, including medical care, employment and education. On July 1, 2017, Guangdong was the first province to implement a coordinated basic pension system for employees. We will build 30 top-notch hospitals in the province, and now there are already 22 such hospitals, among which five are in the three core areas. The provincial government has invested 50 billion yuan in building a community-level medical service system. We will develop various education especially professional education. Moreover, we are optimizing the industrial structure. For instance, Zhanjiang and Jieyang are introducing a number of investment projects each worth tens of billions of yuan.
As for urban-rural development, we will roll out policies and mechanisms to address the unevenness. We will stick to the principle that "urban areas support rural development, and industry promotes agriculture." The province will invest 160 billion yuan over the next 10 years to reshape the rural areas. We will do a good job to offset cultivated land used for other purposes, ink the amount of urban and rural land designated for construction to that of land returned to cultivation, and put returns from the land trade in the fund used to develop rural areas. We will push forward demolition and reclamation projects in rural areas. We are making efforts to advance industrial revival. We have built 150 modern provincial agriculture industrial parks, each granted 50 million yuan in subsidies to develop special agriculture and help raise the income of farmers. We will work hard to improve living conditions in urban and rural areas. We are confident that there will be significant progress within three years, huge achievements within five years, and fundamental changes within 10 years. Thank you.
